.  SHELF  OF  OLD  L.OO 
BY  MRS  JAMES  T  FIELDS 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
RIVERSIDE 


A   SHELF   OF   OLD    BOOKS 


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A  SHELF  OF  OLD  BOOKS 
BYCmRS.  JAMES  T.   FIHLDS' 


n  t 


CHAKl.KS   SCRIBNER'S   SONS 

N1-;W  YORK.     MUCCCXCIV 


Copyright,  1894,  by 
CHARLES  SCRIP.NER'S  SONS 


Press  of  J.  J.  Little  &  Co. 
Astor  Place,  New  York 


PAGE 


CONTFNTS 

Leigh  Hunt, ^ 

Edinburgh, '^9 

From  Milton  to  Tljackeray,       .  141 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 


"My  hliemis  Lilmiry,"       .        =  Fro„iis/,iece. 

Leigh  Hunt, 

By  SciDiiit'l  Laurence. 

Leigh  Hunt,  ..••••"         ^ 
From  a  drauiug  made  in  i8iy. 


Autograph  of  Leigh  Hunt.    .        •        ■        • 
Birthplace  of  Shelley,    .        .        •        •        • 

Keats.  .        • 

From  life  cast. 

Barry  Comical  I,  ■        •  •        ' 

Inscription    in  Marianne   Hunts   Boccaccio. 

Joseph  Severn, 

"Ariel  on  the  Bat's  Back." 
Bv  /.  Severn. 


8 


1 1 


//" 


21 
29 


List  of  Illustrations 


Keats,  . 


31 


From  a  draiciiig  by  Severn. 


Inscription  on  Fly-leaf  of  Diogenes  Laertiiis, 

owned  by  Shelley  and  Leigh  Hunt,  .      ^4 


From  Diogenes  Laertiiis, 


Percy  Bysshe  Shelley, 


Letter  of  Shelley, 


From  Leigh  Hnnt's  Coleridge, 

Leigh  Hnnt's  Annotation,     . 

Note  in  Chancer,  .... 

Grave  of  Shelley, 

Sir  Walter  Scott,         .... 
By  Stuart  Newton. 

A  Note  to  his  Publisher  by  Lord  Byron, 
Rev.  John  Brown,  ..... 


35 
37 
41 


Keats' s    Poem,    "  I   stood    tip-toe    upon    a 

little  hill," 4^ 


45 
56 

5S 
61 

70 

75 
77 


List  of  Illustrations 


Dr.  John  Broun  of  Edinburgh, 

Mirjorie  Fleming, 

By  her  Cousin  Isjbella  Keith 

John  Wilson  ( ' '  Christopher  North  "j, 

IVilliiini  cinJ  Robert  Chambers,     . 

John  Wilson  s  Home  at  Elleray,      • 

De  Qitiucev,  .        .        ■        • 

De  Qjiiiicey  to  Mr.  Fields .    . 

Robert  Burns,       .... 

Portrait  of  RamSiiv, 

Mrs.  Lockhari,  Scott's  Dauohter. . 

Autograph  Poem  by  Allan  Kamsav. 

Sir  Walter  Scott. 

Br  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence. 


XI 

PACE 

79 
S3 


97 

102 

1 05 
I  ID 

"3 
119 

121 
124 
125 

I2i} 


Note  of  Sit  Walter  Scott. 


'    1  > 


xii  List  of  Illustrations 


PAGE 


Miniature  of  Walter  Scott,  made  in  his  fifth 

or  sixth  year, i  ^4 

Walter  Scott,  Father  of  Sir  Walter,      .        .  i  ^6 

Anne  Rutherford,  Sir  Walter  Scott' s  Mother,  1^7 

Lady  Scott, 1^8 

Bust  of  Milton,  about  1 6y4,          .        .         .  142 

Morton,  Milton's  Early  Home,        .        .        .  14^ 

Title-page  of  Milton's  Poems,  with   Gray's 

Autograph, 7^7 

Milton, 73/ 

Letter  of  Dr.  Johnson, 759 

Dr.  Samuel  Johnson, 763 

By  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds. 

Ludlow  Castle, 769 

"  The  Lady's  Last  Stake,"     .        .        .        .177 
By  Hogarth. 

Gar  rick's  l^illa, 7^79 


List  ot  Illustrations 


Xlll 


Letter  of  Charles  Limb, 

Portion  of  a  Letter  from  Mrs.  Procter, 

Henry  Laiees. 

Thackeray  -u-'heii  about  Thirty  Years  Old, 


Sketch, 


Tell  Tale. 


By  IV.  M.  Thackeray. 


By  Crnikshauk. 


PAGE 

I  S3 
igi 

207 

2og 

21 1 


Note  of  IV.  M.   Thackeray. 


214 


LEIGH    HUNT 


\ 

\ 


Portrait  of   Leigh    Hunt,    by    Samuel    Laurence. 


LEIGH    HUNT 

There  is  a  sacredness  about  the  bclon<,nngs 
of  good  and  great  men  which  is  quite  apart 
from  the  value  and  significance  of  the  things 
themselves.  Their  books  l:)econie  especially 
endeared  to  us;  as  we  turn  llic  pages  they 
have  loved,  we  can  see  another  luuul  pointing 
along  the  lines,  another  head  bending  over  the 
open  volume.  A  writer's  books  make  his  work- 
shop and  his  pleasure-house  in  one,  and  \n 
turning  over  his  possessions  we  discover  the 
f^eld  in  which  he  worked  and  the  key  to  his 
"•arden   of  the    llespcrides. 

The  influence  of  Leigh  iiunl's  surrounilings 
upon  John  Keats  illustrates  this  idea  perfectly. 
Keats  was  hard!)'  known,  even  to  himself,  wluii 
I  ei'di  Hunt,  with  his  infallible  touchstone  for 
discerning  literary  excellence  in  others,  recog- 
nized  his  sensitive  nature    and   dn-w    him    into 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


friendly  relations.  Charles  Cowden  Clarke  tells 
us  that  he  went  to  call  on  Leigh  Hunt  one  day, 
at  a  pretty  cottage  in  the  Vale  of  Health,  on 
Hampstead  Heath,  soon  after  he  and  Keats 
had  left  school  and  gone  to  London.  He  car- 
ried in  his  pocket  two  or  three  of  Keats's  son- 
nets, which  he  thought  were  so  good  for  a  youth 
under  aee  that  he  would  venture  to  show  them 
to  Leigh  Hunt,  but  he  was  not  prepared  for 
the  prompt  admiration  with  which  they  were 
received.  The  visit  ended  in  a  promise  that 
he  would  soon  bring  Keats  to  Hampstead.  It 
was  in  the  library  of  this  cottage,  where  one 
night  a  temporary  bed  had  been  made  up  for 
him  on  the  sofa,  that  Keats  composed  the  poem 
on  "  Sleep  and  Poetry,"  inspired  by  his  sur- 
roundings. It  was  a  modest  room,  clothed  with 
such  treasures  as  even  a  poor  man  may  possess, 
but  none  the  less  there  was  inspiration  in  them 
for  a  poet's  brain. 

"  It  was  a  poet's  home  who  keeps  the  keys 
Of  pleasure's  temple — round  about  were  hung 
The  glorious  features  of  the  bards  who  sung 
In  other  ages — cold  and  sacred  busts 
Smiled  at  each  other." 


■I,  I'll-'  ■i.'"m<ni'iiii'i:',!:"'/r/';i! 


PoiUail  of  Leigh  Hunt,     (hioin  n  ijrav»i..t!   inado  in    1815.) 


Leigh  Hunt  7 

Keats's  poem  is  Indeed  an  exquisite  illustra- 
tion of  the  way  in  which  our  brains  and  hearts 
may  be  touched  to  finer  issues  by  such  sur- 
roundings. 

As   I  quote  these  lines,   fearful  of  some  slip 
of  a  treacherous   memor\-,    I   take  a  small  vol- 
ume   of    Keats    from    the    shelf    of    dd    books. 
It  is  a  battered  little  copy  in  -reen  cloth,  with 
the  comfortable  aspect  of  having  been  abroad 
with    some    loving    companion    in     a    summer 
shower.     It   is  the   copy  long  used   b>'  Tenny- 
son, and  evidently  worn   in  his  pocket  on  many 
an  excursion.     He  once  handed  it  to  Mr.  1-ields 
at  parting,  and  it  was  always  cherished  by  the 
latter  with   reverence   and   affection.      Here,  in 
its  quiet  corner,  the  little  book  now  awaits  the 
day  when  some  new  singer  shall  be  moved  to 
song   in  memory  of  the  great  poet  who  loved 
and  treasured  it. 

-Shiny  years  ago  it  was  our  privilege  to  sec 
Leigh  Hunt  in  London,  and  to  make  a  travel- 
ler^ slight  acquaintance  with  the  interior  which 
had  inspired  Keats.  In  response  t-.  a  note  of 
invitation,  a  portion  of  which  is  repnuluced 
here,    we    drove    to    1  lanimer.smith,    wheiv    he 


M^  w~(^ t^ ^^  M  m} h^  ir/if, 

a  t  'J,/h  /? J^  ftfu.  J'tL :        /^/-VfVr^r  K  rut  Uu: 


\ 


Part  of  a  Note  of  Invitation   from   Leigh   Hunt. 


Leigh  Hunt 


was  then  li\-ing.  He  was  an  old  man  with 
snow\-  hair,  contrasting  in  this  respect  with,  the 
portrait  in  these  pages,  whicii  was  taken  in  the 
year  1815,  at  the  request  of  \"incent  Xo\'ello, 
just  as  he  was  leaving  prison.  But  his  e}'es 
were  still  brilliant,  and  the  fascinatinij  jjrace  of 
liis  manner  was  unimpaired.  He  was  naturally 
rather  tall  and  of  a  slender  figure,  but  incessant 
daily  toil  at  the  desk  caused  him  to  stoop  some- 
what, though  his  son  says  of  him.  "  He  was 
straight  as  an  arrow  and  looked  slenderer 
than  he  reall)'  was;"  but  this  was  in  earlier 
years,  before  time  and  toil  had  left  their  im- 
press. 

At  the  period  of  our  visit,  Leigh  Hunt  had 
reached  his  seventy-fifth  year,  and  had  long  ago 
moved  away  from  the  pretty  cottage  at  Hamp- 
stead.  He  was  then  living  in  a  small  house 
—  one  in  a  block  of  wooden  buildings,  if  my 
memor}'  serves  me  —  which  ])rcsented  few  ex- 
ternal attractions  either  to  a  worldl)'  or  ;esthetic 
observer;  but  Leigh  Hunt  was  there,  with  his 
elegance  antl  charm,  like  a  ])riiu"e  in  hiding. 
The  same  treasures  were  armiiul  him.  too. 
which   liudited    Ke.its's  fire  of  song.      The  dreek 


10  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


casts.  "  Sappho's  meek   head,'"  "  Great  Alfred's 
too,"  "  and  Kosciusko's  ;  " 

"  Petrarch,  outstepping  from  the  shady  green, 
Starts  at  the  siylit  of  Laura  ;  nor  can  wean 
His  eyes  from   her  sweet  face." 

There  they  were,  treasures  indeed,  when  we 
remember  that  Keats  opened  his  dream)'  eyes 
upon  them  and  found  in  them  the  moti\'c  of 
his  verse  ;  in  themselves  the}'  were  but  a  few 
casts,  a  few  engravings,  a  few  sketches  in  color, 
a  number  of  well-worn  books,  with  windows 
full  of  flowers,  and  no  heavy  draperies  to  keep 
away  heaven's  light.  The  fresh  white  muslin 
curtains  swayed  in  the  summer  breeze  as  Leigh 
Hunt  talked,  and  the  enchantment  of  his  dis- 
course captivated  us  as  surely  as  it  had  clone 
for  so  many  years  all  those  who  had  come  into 
personal  relation  with  him.  We  forgot  the  tea- 
table  and  forgot  the  hours,  while  he  introduced 
us  to  his  daughters,  to  his  flowers  (he  called 
them  "his  gentle  household  pets"),  and  to  his 
latest  literary  interests  and  occupations.  He 
wore  the  dignity  and  sweetness  of  a  man  not 
only  independent  of  worldly  ambitions,  but  of 


*^^l  >^ 


^•: 


V 


1/1 

'3 


GO 


12  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


one  dependent  upon  unworldly  satisfactions. 
There  was  no  sense  of  defeat  because  he  was  a 
poor  man,  nor  of  inadequacy,  except  for  lack 
of  time  and  strength  to  frequently  "  entertain 
strangers."  He  wore  the  air  of  a  noble  laborer 
—  ceaseless,  indefatigable;  and  when  we  re- 
member that  the  wolf  was  driven  from  his 
door  through  so  long  a  life  by  his  busy  pen,  a 
pen  unarmed  with  popular  force,  he  might  well 
feel  that  the  struggle  had  been  an  honorable 
one.  In  referring  to  his  flowers,  which  were 
just  breaking  into  clusters  of  bloom,  he  fell 
into  a  revery  in  talk  upon  the  mystery  and 
ministry  of  beauty  in  the  world,  a  subject 
which  he  has  made  peculiarly  his  own  ;  but  he 
soon  strayed  into  the  beloved  paths  of  litera- 
ture, and  then  indeed  everything  else  was  for- 
gotten. His  daughters  tried  in  every  way  to 
decoy  him  to  the  table,  but  in  vain,  until  at 
length  they  ran  off  with  half  his  audience, 
when  he  soon  followed. 

Wherever  Hunt  lived,  flowers  seemed  to 
have  been  his  inseparable  companions.  In  his 
younger  days  when  in  prison,  he  papered  his 
walls  with  a  trellis  of  roses,  and   caused  plants 


Leigh  Hunt  13 


to   be   put   before  the   barred   windows.     They 
were  as  characteristic  companions  as  his  books. 
He   managed    to    have  a  wonder    of    a    garden 
also  within  the  prison  limits,  and  he  says  of  it : 
'•  There    was    a    little    yard    outside    the    room, 
railed  ofT  from  another  belonging  to  the  neigh- 
boring ward.     This  yard   I    shut  in  with  green 
palings,  adorned   it  with    a    trellis,  bordered   it 
with  a  thick  bed  of  earth   from   a  nursery,  and 
even  contrived  to  have  a  grass-plot.     The  earth 
I  filled  with  flowers  and  young  trees.    There  was 
an  apple-tree,  from  which  we  managed  to  get  a 
pudding  the  second  year.      As  to  m\'  flowers, 
they    were    allowed    to    be    perfect.      Thomas 
Moore,  who  came  to  see  me  with  Lord  R\-ron. 
told   me  he  had   seen   no   such   heart's-ease.      1 
bought  the  Parnaso  Italiano  while  in  prison,  and 
used  often   to   think  of   a   passage   in   it.  whiU- 
looking    at    this    miniature    piece    of    horticul- 
ture : 

'  Mio  picciol  orto, 
A  me  sei  vigna,  e  c.imi)o,  e  sclva.  e  pralo  liaUli.'  " 

It  seemed  the  most  natural   thing  possible  to 
hear  Leigh  Hunt  talk  of  Shelley  and   Keats  as 


14  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


if  the)'  had  just  closed  the  door  b}'  which  we 
had  entered.  There  was  the  ver\-  couch,  per- 
haps, where  Keats  la\'  down  to  sleep,  after,  as 
he  says,  stra}"ing  "in  Spenser's  halls;"  for  they 
had  no  room  for  him,  we  remember,  and  he 
was  made  to  rest  there  among  the  books;  and 
there,  when   he  awoke,  were 

"Misfht  half  sluml)'rin'j-  on  his  own  rig;ht  arm," 

and  those  other  mysterious  shadows  of  his 
poem. 

Hunt  said,  in  talking  of  Shelley,  "  It  Awas  not 
in  him  to  hate  a  human  being;  but  I  remember 
being  startled  once  b}'  his  saying,  '  Hunt,  why 
is  it  that  we  all  write  love-songs?  why  shouldn't 
we  write  hate-songs  ?  '  And  he  said  he  A\ould 
some  day,  poor  fellow !  I  believe,  however, 
that  he  really  did  dislike  the  second  Mrs.  God- 
win, because  she  was  incapable  of  telling  the 
truth,  and  he  used  to  say,  when  he  was  obliged 
to  dine  with  her,  '  that  he  would  lean  back  in 
his  chair  and  languish  into  hate.'  "  It  was 
interesting,  too,  in  view  of  the  unsatisfactory 
portraits  and  busts  of  Shelle\-,  to  hear  Leigh 
Hunt    say  that   "no   one  could    describe   him," 


Lei^ilh  Hunt  15 

and  that  ho  always  seemed  "as  if  he  were  just 
alit  from  the  planet  Mercury,  bearini,^  a  win-jjed 
wand  tipped  with  flame." 

Although  our  visit  to  Lei-h  Hunt  was  within 
a  few  months  of  his  death,  the  native  elasticity 
of  his  mind  and  the  living  grace  of  his  manner 
were    undimmetl.      lie    wore   no   aspect    ot    the 
coming  change,  and  the  wan  aj^pearance  of  the 
portrait    affixed    to    his  Autobiography  was  so 
foreign  to  our  memory  of  him   that  Mr.  Fields 
has  inscribed  above  it,  '•  I   saw   Leigh  Hunt   in 
1859,  ^''^'-^  ^^^'^  portrait   bears  no  resemblance  to 
the  poet  as  I  saw  him.     J.  T.  I'."'     There  is  n.> 
Lei"-h  Hunt  now  to  enchant,  and  n.i   Keats  to 
be  enchanted  among  the  old  books;  but  as  we 
stand  silentl>-  in   the  corner  where  the  volumes 
rest  together,  watching  the  interchanging  lights 
thrown  through  green   branches  from  the  shin- 
uvj    river    bevond,    we    remember    that     these 
causes    of    inspiration   still   abide   with    us,   ami 
that    other    book-lovers   are    yet    to    pore    over 
the.se    shelves   and    gather    fresh    life    from    the 
venerable  volumes  which  stand  ui)on  tluni. 

John   Sterling  said.   m,in\-  >-ears  ago.  "  1  hey 
onlv  find    who   know    where  to  look."      It    was 


i6  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


a    skilful    eye    as   well    as    a    loving    hand    that 
brought  this  collection  of  books  together.     It  is 
not  one  of  the  well-equipped  libraries  of  a  rich 
man,  and    we    are  sometimes   led    to   think,    in 
these   later   days   of   accessible   public  libraries, 
that    it    is   a   mistake    to    multiply   books,    with 
their    attendant    care,    in    private    houses;    but 
"  My  Friend's  Library "   is  a  collection  of  vol- 
umes   which    the    collector    himself    read    and 
loved,    interspersed    with    such    treasures    as    I 
have  hinted  at — books  which  have  belonged  to 
other  writers,  and  been  loved  by  readers  whose 
very  names  are  sacred. 

The  shelves  near  which  we  have  been  pausing 
are  dedicated  especially  to  Leigh  Hunt's  books. 
He  was  himself  the  prince  of  careful  readers, 
enriching  the  pages  as  he  passed  over  them 
with  marks  and  comments  which  will  serve  to 
indicate  passages  of  subtile  meaning  or  noble 
incentive  to  all  those  who  follow  him  while  the 
books  remain. 

The  history  of  the  transfer  of  these  volume-s 
to  our  shores  is  easily  told.  "  It  is  amazing," 
Dickens  used  to  say,  as  if  he  were  perceiving 
something  nobody  had  ever  thought  of  before. 


-^ 


I 


CJ:       .an- 


'^    ,Wi— ~.> 


'  ^iri 


^J><^'^ 


='-->;>i/  ■/ 


Miss  Whitney's  Bust  of  Keats. 


1 8  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


"  it  is  amazing  what  love  can  do  !  "  And  it  was 
love    for   Leigh    Hunt    personal!}'   which    rcall}' 
brouc:ht    these   books   of   his  to   America.     Al- 
though  the  best  of  readers,  he  was  a  man  who 
believed  in  a  generous  use  of  books,  and  he  lent 
and  fjave  them  away  as  if  he  were  almost  indif- 
ferent  to  their  preservation.     Those  which  were 
dearest  and  most  useful  somehow  clung  about 
him,  yet  the  number  of  broken  sets  of  valuable- 
books  among  his  collection  is  almost  incredible. 
Such  as  they  were,  however,  Mr.  Fields  desired 
to  have  them,  and  they  were  all  despatched  to 
him    soon    after    Leigh    Hunt's    death.      There 
were  about   four  hundred  and  fifty  volumes  al- 
tofiether,  and  of  these  Mr.  Fields  kept  less  than 
two  hundred.     "  I  was  foolish  not  to  have  kept 
them   all,"  he  often  said  in  later  years;  but  at 
the   moment    many  persons  appeared   who   ex- 
pressed   great   enthusiasm    about    them,    and    it 
seemed  like  a  kind  of  selfishness  to  keep  them 
all.     More    than    half    the    collection   was   scat- 
tered,   and    many    have    changed     hands    more 
than    once    since  that  time.     We    do    not    like 
to    think    of    them    wandering  about  homeless, 
or    possibly    finding    shelter    in    some    second- 


Leigh  Hunt  19 


hand  book-shop,  gazing"  helplessly  from  unlo\cd 
shelves. 

The  interest  which  hanijs  about  this  little 
group,  thus  snatched  as  it  were  from  oblivion, 
is  sufficient  to  detain  us  in  this  paper.  A 
liappy  chance  brought  us  to  this  slielf:  let  us 
not  wander  just   now   farther  afield. 

Leigh  Hunt's  association  with  the  men  of 
letters  of  his  time  was  close  and  single-hearted. 
Xo  man  ever  held  more  firmly  to  the  path  he 
had  chosen.  He  was,  as  I  have  said,  continually 
at  his  work.  To  call  a  man  of  his  tastes  and 
temperament  no  lover  of  pleasure,  would  seem 
strangely  inconsistent ;  but  his  pleasures  were 
taken  in  Shakespeare's  forest,  in  Spenser's  pal- 
ace, in  Cowley's  garden,  in  Herbert's  church. 
He  need  not  leave  his  own  fireside  for  his  fin- 
est enjoyments,  and  it  was  seldom  indeed  that 
Lord  Holland  or  aii}body  else  could  lure  him 
away  from  his  writing-desk  to  the  dinner-table. 
He  was  no  diner-out  ;  nevertheless,  he  became 
the  intimate  of  the  most  interesting  men  of 
his  time.  He  was  the  friend  and  biographer 
of  lU-ron,  he  was  greatly  beloved  b\-  Shelle\', 
and   we  have  alreadv  seen    how  much    he  con- 


20  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


tributed  to  the  happiness  of  Keats.  He  loved 
Shelley  more  deeply  than  the  rest,  and  saw 
him  much  more  intimately  ;  but  Carlyle,  Haz- 
litt,  Lamb,  and  Barry  Cornwall,  and  the  No- 
vellos,  not  to  mention  other  famous  writers, 
musicians,  and  artists  of  his  day,  were  all 
upon  friendly  terms  with  him.  Once  only  did 
we  meet  him  at  dinner,  at  ]\Irs.  Procter's.  It 
was  a  memorable  occasion.  Adelaide  Proc- 
ter, Hawthorne,  Charles  Sumner,  Kinglake, 
and  other  celebrities  were  present ;  but  Leigh 
Hunt's  winning  aspect  and  delightful  talk  made 
the  occasion  truly  sympathetic  and  agreeable. 
I  can  recall,  as  we  left  the  table,  Barry  Cornwall 
putting  his  arm  about  Hunt's  shoulder,  as  they 
went  up  the  stair,  with  the  affectionate  look  of 
one  who  saw  his  dear  friend  only  too  rareh'. 
Indeed,  we  were  afterward  told  it  was  the  last 
time  he  dined  out   in   company. 

His  social  spirit  is  shown  by  the  manner  of 
his  reading.  He  could  never  keep  the  good 
things  to  himself.  He  was  truly  "  The  Indi- 
cator"  and  ''The  Seer"  for  those  who  Avere  to 
read  after  him.  Up  and  down  the  pages  run 
notes  and   marks  to  attract  the  attention  of  the 


Leis:h  Hunt 


21 


unwary.  No  fine  epithet,  n..  delicate  allusion, 
no  fittin-^  word,  was  lost  upon  his  sensitive 
ear.  We  cannot  help  touchini;  the  paijes  with 
veneration  which  have   been    read,  re-read,  and 


J^^ 


'/ 


Barry  Cornwall. 

made  precious  by  si^nis  that  serve  as  intellect- 
ual   '^aiides  to   the   mind. 

The  books   relatin<(    to    Lei-h   Iluni    in   this 
collection    may    \n-    divide.l    into    two    ^^.-oups : 


22 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


first,  those  of  his  own  writing ;  and,  second, 
those  from  which  he  often  drew  his  inspiration, 
the  books  he  loved  to  feed  upon,  his  best  com- 
panions. It  is  interesting  to  stand  in  this  way, 
as  it  were,  between  the  student  and  the  author, 
on  the  si'ound  between  the  conception  and 
the  finished  work.  By  following  his  footsteps 
through  the  books  he  loved,  we  gather  new 
light  upon  these  companions  of  the  mind,  and 
at  the  same  moment  we  gain  fresh  appreciation 
of  Hunt's  own  peculiar  talent  for  making  the 
antique  seed-grain   bloom    again. 

In  looking  over  the  works  of  any  true  poet, 
and  such  Leigh  Hunt  undoubtedly  was,  we 
must  in  justice  seek  to  know  him  in  his  poems  ; 
for,  however  well  a  poet  may  write  prose,  we 
must  search  his  poetry  to  learn  his  most  sin- 
cere expression  and  to  discover  that  capacity, 
if  he  have  it,  for  rising  above  his  subject,  which 
is  a  necessary  quality  of  all  good  writing. 

In  Leigh  Hunt's  books  we  can  often  discover 
the  suggestions  and  inspirations  of  his  poems. 
It  might  be  so,  perhaps,  with  many  another 
poet  if  we  could  find  just  such  another  reader. 
But  he  may  be  called  an  imprisoned  singer,  not 


Leigh  Hunt  23 


alone  in  those  years  when  he  was  actually  shut 
in  prison  walls,  but  by  reason  of  his  constant 
confinement  to  his  desk  because  of  the  neces- 
sity for  continual  toil.  Many  of  these  hours, 
too,  in  his  ripest  manhood,  were  passed  in  the 
prosaic  labor  of  a  newspaper  man's  office.  He 
found  his  refreshment  and  compensation  in 
books.  "  The  Story  of  Rimini,"  redolent  as  it 
is  of  Italy,  was  written  in  his  London  prison, 
long  before  Italy  was  anything  but  a  dream  to 
him.  It  is  far  from  wonderful  that  the  poem  is 
no  better  ;  the  wonder  is  that  it  has  life  at  all. 

Hunt's  love  of  Italy  was  very  early  awak- 
ened, and  we  have  a  delightful  glimpse  of  him 
as  a  boy,  first  learning  Italian  at  Christ's  Hos- 
pital with  his  friend  Barnes.  It  was  a  time  of 
intense  enjoyment.  "  We  went  shouting  the 
beginning  of  Metastasio's  '  Ode  to  Venus,'  "  he 
says,  "  as  loud  as  we  could  bawl,  over  the 
Hornsey  fields,  and  I  can  repeat  it  to  this  day 
from  those  first  lessons." 

Here  is  the  large  old  c(jp\' of  "  Tlie  Novels 
and  Tales  of  the  Renowned  Jcjhn  Boccaccio, 
the  first  Refiner  of  Italian  Prose:  containing  A 
Hundred   Curious  Novels,  by  Seven    Honorable 


24  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Ladies  and  Three  Noble  Gentlemen,  Framed 
in  Ten  Days."  It  was  printed  in  London  in 
1684,  and  bears  upon  the  first  fly-leaf  the  fol- 
lowing inscription  : 

"  To  Marianne  Hunt — 
"  Her  Boccaccio  {alter  ct  idcni)  come  back 
to  her  after  many  years'  absence,  for  her 
good-nature  in  giving  it  away  in  a  foreign 
country  to  a  traveller  whose  want  of  books  was 
still  worse  than   her   own. 

"  From  her  affectionate  husband, 

Leigh  Hunt. 
''August  23,  1839. — Chelsea." 

Boccaccio  was  one  of  Leigh  Hunt's  prime 
favorites,  and  there  is  another  cop}'  in  different 
form  close  at  hand.  This  time  it  is  in  two 
small  leather-covered  volumes  printed  "in 
Venezia,"  in  the  year  1542.  The  autograph 
inscription    on    the    title-page    is   as    follows : 

"  These  volumes  are  presented  as  a  slight  but 
'heartfelt  acknowledgement  for  the  kindnesses 
received  by  John  Wilson  from  Leigh  Hunt 
Esqre. 

"  December  3d    1840." 


^ 


4 


^ 

> 


V 


« 
^ 


In 


^ 


if 


^ 


1       ; 


v^ 


4 


26  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Unhappily  Leigh  Hunt's  copy  of  Dante  is 
not  among  the  old  books ;  perhaps  it  never 
came  to  America.  I  only  find  three  vol- 
umes of  Commentaries  on  the  Poets  of  Italy, 
which  Avere  evidently  useful  books  to  him,  and 
the  Memoirs  (in  English)  of  Alessandro  Tas- 
soni.  Near  these  stand  his  own  two  volumes  of 
"  Stories  from  Italian  Poets,"  which  are  dedi- 
cated to  Shelley.  They  arc  in  the  form  of  a 
summary  of  the  great  works  by  the  five  prin- 
cipal narrative  poets  of  Italy — Dante,  Pulci, 
Boiardo,  Ariosto,  and  Tasso — and  they  prove  to 
us  at  least  the  careful  study  he  had  bestowed 
upon  Italian  literature.  Many  of  the  most 
precious  of  Leigh  Hunt's  old  books  are  asso- 
ciated with  that  portion  of  his  life  passed  in 
Italy  ;  chiefly,  in  our  minds,  perhaps,  because 
Shelley  and  Keats,  his  dearest  friends,  died 
there,  and  because  his  friendship  for  Shelley 
ripened  upon  Italian  soil.  There  are  three  of 
these  books  standing  in  a  row,  which  must  be 
looked  upon  especially  with  reverence,  I  be- 
Heve,  by  all  lovers  of  literature.  The  first  is 
an  illustrated  cop\'  of  Shelley's  poems,  the  one 
edited    by  Mrs.  Shelley  and   dedicated   to  their 


Leigh  Hunt 


27 


son.   after   Shelley's    death,   in    1839.      It    bears 
upon    its    title-page    the    following    inscription  : 


% 


Joseph  Severn. 

"To    I\lai-iannr     limit     on     Iut    birthda)-,    Sep. 
2S,      l(S44,     from     her     lo\ing     husband      i-eigii 


28  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Hunt."  This  edition  contains  two  interesting 
portraits  of  Shelley,  and  a  picture  of  Field 
Place,  in  Sussex,  where  he  was  born  ;  also  an 
etching  of  the  cottage  in  which  he  lived  at 
Marlowe,  and  two  different  views  of  his  burial 
place. 

There  is  also  laid  between  the  leaves  of  this 
book,  at  the  opening  of  the  "  Adonais,"  a  letter 
from  Joseph  Severn,  of  whom  Shelley  says  in 
his  preface  to  the  poem  (as  all  the  world  forever 
will  remember) :  "  He  (Keats)  was  accompa- 
nied to  Rome  by  Mr.  Severn,  a  young  artist 
of  the  highest  promise,  who,  I  have  been  in- 
formed, '  almost  risked  his  own  life,  and  sacri- 
ficed every  prospect  to  unwearied  attendance 
upon  his  dying  friend.'  Had  I  known  these 
circumstances  before  the  completion  of  my 
poem,  I  should  have  been  tempted  to  add  my 
feeble  tribute  of  applause  to  the  more  solid 
recompense  which  the  virtuous  man  finds  in 
the  recollection  of  his  own  motives.  Mr. 
Severn  can  dispense  with  a  reward  from  '  such 
stuff  as  dreams  arc  made  of.'  His  conduct  is 
a  eolden  aufjurv  of  the  success  of  his  future 
career — may    the    unextinguished   Spirit   of  his 


ij 


30  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


illustrious  friend  animate  the  creations  of 
his  pencil,  and  plead  against  Oblivion  for  his 
name  I  "  In  Severn's  letter,  which  is  addressed 
to  Mr.  Fields  in  1871,  he  says,  "  I  confess  that  I 
live  upon  the  past."  He  encloses  a  photograph 
of  himself  (and  this  also  is  inserted),  taken  from 
a  picture  made  when  he  was  but  twenty-seven 
}'ears  old,  adding,  "  My  lanthorn  jaws  I  do  not 
send."  It  is  b}-  no  means  a  disappointing  face, 
but  one  full  of  gentleness  and  enthusiasm. 

The  mention  of  Severn's  name  leads  me  to 
other  unpublished  letters  from  him,  containing 
further  particulars  of  those  early  days  when  he 
Avas  with  Keats.  To  that  period  also  belongs 
a  picture  which  hangs  near  the  books,  of 
■"  Ariel  on  the  Bat's  Back,"  a  fanciful  and  yet 
realistic  bit  of  painting,  giving  a  good  idea 
of  Severn's  own  ability  at  his  ripest  period. 
We  learn  the  origin  of  his  paper  on  Keats, 
written  for  the  Atlantic  JMoiithly  of  April, 
1863,  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Fields.'  He  says,  "At 
last  I  have  performed  my  promise  to  }'Ou  in 
writing  a  paper  on  Keats,  which  I  now  enclose. 
You  \\-ill  be  interested  b\'  the  romantic 
incident   in    m\'   Keats  paper,    of  xwy  charming 


r 

I 


From  a  drawing  of  Keats  by  Severn,   in  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Fields. 


Leigh  Hunt  35 


meeting  with  the  poet's  sister  in  Rome,  and 
that  we  have  become  Hke  brother  and  sister. 
She  lives  here  with  her  Spanish  family  ;  her 
name  is  Llanos  ;  she  was  married  to  a  distin- 
guished Spanish  patriot  and  author,  and  lias 
two  sons  and  two  daughters,  one  of  whom  is 
married  to  Brockman,  the  Spanish  director  of 
the  Roman  railways.     .     .     . 

'•  I  am  glad  you  saw  my  posthumous  portrait 
of  Keats.  It  was  an  effort  to  erase  his  dead 
figure  from  my  memory  and  represent  my  last 
pleasant  sight  of  him."  And  in  another  letter, 
referring  to  the  drawing  of  Keats  reproduced 
here,  he  says :  "  I  am  your  debtor,  for  you  set 
me  about  a  task  so  congenial  that  when  my 
daughter  saw  me  draw  it  she  declared  it  was 
an  inspiration  and  implored  me  to  do  her  also  a 
sketch  of  Keats.  I  am  glad  to  assure  you  that 
it  is  a  good  likeness,  and  gave  me  delight  even 
in  this   respect,  in  calling  up  his  dear  image." 

The  second,  of  the  three  interesting  books 
already  referred  to,  is  an  old  brown  leather- 
covered  volume,  which  is  more  closely  associated 
with  Shelley  and  Leigh  Hunt  than  any  of  the 
others.  Shelley's  generosity  was  unbounded, 
3 


34 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


X 


o 
Q 


and  in  his  eagerness  to  have  Hunt  share  his 
enjoyments  he  would  often  part  for  a  time 
even  with  his  most  precious  books.    The  names 


1 


Leigh  Hunt  ?s 


of  the  two  friends  stand  upon  the  fly-leaf  of 
this  copy  of  Diogenes  Laertius.  It  is  written 
in  Greek  and  Latin,  with  double  columns;  but 
the  notes,  which  appear  to  be  all  written  b\- 
Shelley,  are  in   Greek  and   English.      Unfortu- 

j^2  PLATO.    Lib.  III. 

lamdudum  viuis  luctbas    lucifer ,  at 
mine 
ExtinftHs  luces  Hefperns  Elyfiis. 

30)  In  Dionem  vero  ia  hunc 
snodiim: 

Et  liurymas  Hecnbae ,  et  Troianis  /«• 
ta  puillis 

JDecreuere  receiis  ex  genitrice  fatii. 
At  tibi  pojl  partos   fraeckro    Matte 

From  Shelley's  Copy  of  Diogenes  Laertius.     (The   lines  prefixed  to 
"  Adonais.") 

nately  they  are  written  in  pencil,  and  are  slowly 
but    surely  disappearing. 

One  of  the  first  written  is  still  legible:  ''To 
read  Diogenes  again  and  again.''  Mrs.  Shel- 
ley says  of  her  husband  :  "  His  extreme  sen- 
sibility gave  the  intensity  of  passion  to  his 
intellectual  pursuits  ;  "  and  we  feel,  as  his  eyes 
ranged  over  the  splendid  garden  of  the  ancients 


36  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


which  this  book  spread  out  before  him,  how 
the  passion  grew,  and  how  the  light  of  his  spirit 
vivified  the  printed  lines.  He  marked  page 
after  page  for  reference  ;  poems  rose  before  his 
fancy  as  he  read,  until  at  length  the  lines  of 
Plato  shone  upon  him  which  now  stand  as 
prelude  to  the  "  Adonais."  They  are  from  an 
epitaph  upon  a  certain  Stella,  and  may  be 
rendered    into    English  as  follows  : 

"  Living-,  you  shone  as  Lucifer  in  the  morning-  sky  ; 
Dead,  you  now  shine  as  Hesperus  among  the  shades." 

But  why  translate  them  into  prose,  when 
Shelley  himself  has  left  them  crystallized  in  the 
heart  of  an  English  verse  ! 

"  Thou  wert  the  mornine  star  among-  the  Hving-, 
Ere  thy  fair  light  had  fled  ; — 
Now,  having  died,  thou  art  as  Hesperus,  giving 
New  splendor  to  the  dead."  ^ 

*  I  found  the  following  translation  of  this  verse  among  the 
Greek  fragments  of  that  unrivalled  translator  and  poet,  Edward 
H.  Fitz-Gerald: 

"  Star  of  the  inorning  shinedst  thou, 
Ere  life  had  fled  : 
Star  of  the  evening  art  thou  now 
Among  the  dead  !  " 


'f 


.^. 


Percy   Bybiht   Shelley. 


Leigh  Hunt  39 


It  is  no  stretch  of   imagination  to  see  Shelley 
with  this  book   under   the   olive-trees  on   some 
solitary    height,   or  floating  with    it   as  his  sole 
companion  in  his  fateful  boat.     His  love  for  it 
was    not    a    passing    fancy  ;  he  seems  to  have 
lived  with  it  for  several  years,  as  we  find   men- 
tion of  it   first   in   the   year   1814,    in    Professor 
Dowden's    deeply    interesting    biography.       In 
that  most   miserable  season  when  Shelley  was 
in  hidin"-  from  the  bailiffs,  Mary  writes  to  him 
from  her    solitary   lodgings  :  "  Will  you   be   at 
the  door  of  the  Coffee  House  at  five  o'clock,  as 
it  is  disagreeable  to    go    into    such    places  ?     I 
shall  be  there  exactly  at  that  time,  and  we  can 
CTo  into   St.  Paul's,  where  we   can   sit  down.      I 
send   you    Diogenes,  as   you    have    no    books." 
Professor  Dowden  adds  in  a  note  :  "  Probably  a 
translation  of  Wieland's  Diogenes  ;  "   but    in   a 
list  of  books  read   by  Mary  and   Shelley  during 
that  year,  a  few  pages  further  on,  it  is  distinctly 
set  down  as  "  Diogenes  Laertius." 

In  the  "Adonais"  we  feel  that  Shelley's 
genius  tried  his  bravest  wing;  and  for  the  key- 
note of  this  great  pf)c'm  lie  found  and  marked 
the    verses    alread}-    (pioted.      Perhaps    he    saw 


40  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


from  his  mount  of  vision  another  star,  his  own, 
and  knew  that  he  soon  should  follow  to  the 
kingdom  of  the  shades.  "  It  was  more  than 
fifty  years  ago  that  this  old  book  went  wander- 
ing about  the  continent,"  Mr.  Fields  writes, 
"  with  the  two  young  English  poets,  and  was 
thumbed  by  them  on  the  decks  of  vessels,  in 
the  chambers  of  out-of-the-way  inns,  and  under 
the  olive-trees  of  Pisa  and  Genoa." 

Now  it  is  at  last  safely  housed,  and  with  its 
plain  brown  coat,  a  hermit  thrush  among  books, 
stands  unsuspected  in  its  quiet  corner.  By  and 
by  will  not  some  other  lover  in  some  later  age 
hear  the  voice  again  ? 

Standing  next  to  Diogenes  Laertius  on  the 
shelf,  is  the  third  volume  to  which  we  have 
referred,  a  book  where  Coleridge,  Shelley, 
and  Keats  stand  bound  together,  three  in  one, 
with  Leigh  Hunt's  notes  sometimes  covering 
the  margins.  This  book  was  a  petted  posses- 
sion both  of  Hunt  and  its  last  owner.  It  is 
enriched  with  autographs  of  each  of  the  au- 
thors, and  upon  the  fly-leaf  at  the  back  Leigh 
Hunt  has  copied  a  poem  written  to  him  by 
Keats  "  On    the    Story  of   Rimini."     This  was 


42  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


sent  originally  to  Hunt  inscribed  on  the  first 
leaf  of   a  presentation  copy  of  Keats's  poems. 

The  pages  of  this  volume  also  are  worn  at  the 
edges,  and,  in  spite  of  a  second  binding,  it  will 
afflict  no  lover  of  books  by  too  great  freshness. 

There  is  a  letter  from  Coleridge  laid  between 
its  leaves,  a  feast  one  comes  upon  in  turning 
them,  as  if  quite  by  chance.  It  is  "  very 
characteristic,"  as  catalogues  say.  There  is  one 
also  by  Shelley,  a  few  pages  further  on,  that  is 
brief,  and  at  first  sight  not  at  all  characteristic. 
He  writes : 

"  Dear  Sir,  Enclosed  is  a  check  for  (within  a 

few  shillings)   the  amount  of  your  bill.     Can't 

you    make    the    Booksellers    subscribe  more  of 

the  Poem  ? 

Your  most  obedient  serv. 

Percy  Bysshe  Shelley. 
"Jan.  i6,  1818." 

The  autograph  of  Keats  in  this  volume  is  a 
part  of  the  first  draught  of  the  poem,  "  I  stood 
tip-toe  upon  a  little  hill,"  the  motto  of  which 
poem   is  a  line  by  Leigh   Hunt, 

"  Places  of  nestling  green  for  poets  made." 


'fi  '^  f  f^^^-^  "^Z 


44 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


The  autograph  is  marked  as  received  by  Mr. 
Fields  from  his  friend  Charles  Cowden  Clarke. 
The  name  of  Keats's  schoolfellow  calls  to  mind 
a  line  from  "  The  Eve  of  St.  Agnes  "  for  which 
Clarke  was  responsible.  It  seems,  even  in  their 
school-days,  Clarke  had  access  to  a  piano  ;  and 
in  after  years,  when  Keats  was  one  day  reading 
to  him  from  the  poem,  which  was  still  in  manu- 
script, the  line, 

"The  hall  door  shuts  again,  and  all  the  noise  is  gone," 

"  That  line,"  he  said,  "  came  into  my  head 
when  I  remembered  how  I  used  to  listen  in 
bed  to  your  music  at  school." 

But  Keats's  autograph  in  this  volume  of  the 
three  poets  is  of  unusual  value  ;  not  only  be- 
cause it  contains  certain  lines  beloved  by  all 
readers  of  poetry,  but  because  we  gain  a  glimpse 
into  the  very  workshop  of  the  poet's  brain. 
The  lines  now  stand : 

"Open   afresh  your  round  of  starry  folds, 
Ye  ardent  Marigolds!" 

But  we  see  how  he  toiled  after  the  perfected 


Leigh  Hunt 


45 


loveliness  of  these  verses  when  we    study  his 
manuscript.     He  starts  off, 

"Come  ye  bright  Marigolds," 

and    then    his    impatient    pen    dashes    out    the 


64 


COLERIDGE'S  PO 


^Someiimes.  a-droppiniT  from  llie  sky. 
1  heard  (lie  sky-lark  sin/;  ; 
^mclimes  all  liiile  birds  lliat  an- 
How  they  sccm'd  lo  Tdl  [he  sea  and  air, 

\Viih  iheir  sweet  jargoning  ! 

>  I. 

And  now  't  was  like  all  instriimepts. 

~Now  like  a  lonely  (luic^ 

And  now  it  is  an  an|^e!'s  sontr 
'  1  hal  makes  llu;  Heavens  be  mute. 

It  ceased  ;  yet  still  the  sails  made  on 
"A  pleasant  noise  till  noon. 
A  noise  like  of  a  hidden  brook 
'In  tlie  leafy  month  of  June  "^ 
jMiat  to  llie  sloe [lin/;  WQ^ds  all  niijlit 


Singeth  a  quiet  tune 


From  Leigh  Hunt's  Annotated   Copy  of  Coleridge's  Poems. 

passage,  and  he  begins  again.  At  last  the  right 
words  came,  and  he  knew  tliem  and  was  content. 
Writing  of  books,  Charles  Lamb  says  some- 
where: "  Reader,  if  haply  tliou  art  blessed  with 
a  moderate  collection,  be  shy  of  showing  it ;  or 
if  thy  heart  overfloweth  to  lend  them,  lend  tli\' 
books  ;  but  let  it  be  to  such  an  one  as  S.  T.  C. 


46  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


— he  will  return  them  (generally  anticipating 
the  time  appointed)  with  usury  ;  enriched  with 
annotations  tripling  their  value.  I  have  had 
experience."  In  his  turn,  Coleridge  receives  in 
this  volume  the  like  tribute  of  annotation  from 
Leigh  Hunt.  Line  after  line  is  underscored 
with  an  emphasis  that  will  not  let  you  turn  the 
page  till  you  have  read  them.  The  lovely  pas- 
sages seem  to  szain  at  least  a  double  value  from 
his  siens  of  admiration. 


'fc>" 


It  is  dangerous  to  gather  flowers  in  such 
fields!  They  rise  in  crowds  about  us,  and  we 
regret  a  seeming  partiality.  When  Ave  come  to 
"  Kubla  Khan,"  hardly  a  line  escapes  Hunt's 
index  ;  we  seem  to  read  certain  things  with  him 
for  the  first  time,  and  are  startled  by  their  won- 
drous beauty.  "  Youth  and  Age,"  "  A  Day 
Dream,"  "  The  Ancient  Mariner,"  and  "  Christa- 
bel,"  are,  of  course,  especially  marked,  as  if  he 
really  could  not  contain  his  wonder  and  his 
delight. 

In  returning  to  Leigh  Hunt's  own  poems,  we 
are  still  able,  as  I  have  said,  to  trace  the  origin 
of  many  an  inspiration  back  to  these  old  books. 


Lei2;h  Hunt  47 


Among  his  productions  one  of  the  first  in 
value  is  certainly  that  beautiful  brief  story  of 
Abou  Ben  Adhem.  The  matter  of  this  poem 
lies  like  an  embedded  jewel  in  the  Bibliotlicqiie 
Orientate.  We  have  only  to  read  the  two  or 
three  long  prose  paragraphs  contained  therein, 
giving  the  history  of  Abou,  to  wonder  even 
more  than  ever  at  the  transmitting  power  of 
Hunt's  poetic  pen.  It  is  dull  reading  enough, 
compared  with  the  poem. 

The  book,  however,  is  a  precious  one,  in  spite 
of  its  prosaicisms,  or  perhaps  because  of  them  ; 
for  not  only  does  it  contain  the  seed-grain  of 
"Abou  Ben  Adhem,"  but  the  suggestion  of 
another  of  Hunt's  best  poems  may  be  found  in 
its  pages.  "  The  Trumpets  of  Doolkarnein  "  is 
a  longer  poem  and  far  less  known  than  "Abou 
Ben  Adhem,"  but  it  was  Longfellow's  favorite 
among  the  works  of  Leigh  Hunt.  Of  his 
copies  of  Theocritus,  Redi,  and  Alfieri,  all 
kindred  spirits  to  his  own,  and  inciters  in  his 
mind  to  fresh  poetry,  there  is  no  room  to  write. 
Readers  of  Leigh  Hunt's  books  will  see  how 
unaffectedly  he  delighted  in  these  authors,  and 
how  much  he  drew  from  them. 


48  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


But  before  closing  the  volume  of  his  own 
poetry,  we  must  recall  that  charming  rondeau 
about  Mrs.  Carlyle,  who  was  so  much  more 
delightful  a  cause  of  inspiration  than  even 
our  old  books  I 

"Jenny  kissed   me  when   we   met, 

Jumping  from   the  chair  she  sat  in  ; 
Time,  you  thief,  who  love  to  get 

Sweets  into  your  list,  put  that  in  : 
Say  I'm  weary,  say  I'm  sad. 

Say  thai   health  and  wealth  have  missed  me, 
Say  I'm  growing  old,  but  add, 

Jenny  kiss'd  me." 

In  his  Autobiograph}-  Leigh  Hunt  says, 
speaking  of  his  school-days :  "  My  favorite 
books  out  of  school-hours  were  Spenser,  Col- 
Hns,  Gray,  and  the  Arabian  Nights."'  This  last 
he  has  italicized,  and  it  is  a  pleasure  to  find  his 
copy  among  these  volumes  ;  probably  not  the 
very  same  he  read  at  school,  but  the  one  pre- 
sented, as  the  inscription  on  the  title-page 
tells  us, 


"To    Vincent    Leigh     Hunt     from     his    loving 

Father." 


Leigh  Hunt  49 


and  the  one  Leigh  Hunt  read  many  tinies  in 
his  later  }'cars.  It  is  filled  with  those  delicate 
strokes  of  the  pen  which  he  loved  to  draw,  not 
only  at  the  side  of  a  favorite  passage,  but  under 
every  word,  until  the  reader  can  seem  to  taste 
the  savor  with  which  he  devoured  them.  The 
"  Arabian  Nights  "  never  lost  their  fascination 
for  him.  At  the  end  of  the  fifth  volume  he 
writes  the   following  note  : 

"  Finished  another  regular  reading  of  these 
enchanting  stories,  for  I  know  not  what  time, — 
but   after   '  many  a   time  and   <?//,' — September 

26,  1836. 

Leigh  Hunt." 

He  was  then  fifty-two  years  old.  His  notes 
in  these  volumes  are  extraordinary  reading, 
because  the  childlikcness  of  his  mind  is  so 
apparent  in  them.  When  he  underlines  a  pas- 
sage like  the  following,  we  feel  how  the  wonder 
was  still   a   fresh   one  as   he   read. 

"  When  the  smoke  was  all  out  of  the  vessel,  it 
reunited,  ami  became  a  solid  body,  of  which  zvas 
formed  a  genie  tivice  as  high  as  the  greatest  of 

giants!' 

4 


50  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


He  evidently  disapproves  of  the  editor  of 
this  edition  (1811)  because  he  is  inclined  to 
moralize:  "Why  can't  you  let  us  judge  for 
ourselves,"  he  writes  once,  almost  pettishly,  in 
the  margin.  Again,  when,  about  midnight, 
"  Maimoune  sprung  lightly  to  the  mouth  of 
the  well,  to  wander  about  the  world,  after  her 
wonted  custom,"  Leigh  Hunt  writes,  with  droll 
gravity,  on  the  leaf :  "  Fairy  princesses,  who 
live  in  wells,  must  be  of  a  different  order  of 
royalty  from  those  who  inhabit  subterranean 
bowers." 

Nothing  could  be  more  characteristic  or  bring 
the  poet  before  us  in  his  true  light  more  clearly 
than  these  fascinating  notes.  He  takes  it  all  so 
seriously,  as,  for  instance,  in  these  comments  : 
"  There  is  a  curious  mixture  of  noble  and  infe- 
rior taste  in  this  description.  The  white  pillars 
and  embroideries  of  white  and  red  roses  on 
cloth  of  gold  are  exquisite  ;  and  the  balconies 
fitted  up  like  sophas  and  looking  out  into  gar- 
dens are  fit  for  them.  Not  so  the  shop-full  of 
roses,  the  coloured  pebbles,  the  gilt  brass  and 
the  fighting  birds.  There  is  doubtless,  how- 
ever, a  national  truth   in  the  picture  which  has 


Lei^h  Hunt  51 


an  interest  of  its  own."  When  the  prince  in 
the  story  "  could  not  forbear  expressing  in  his 
sone  that  he  knew  not  whether  he  was  going 
to  drink  the  wine  she  had  presented  to  him  or 
his  own  tears,"  Leigh  Hunt's  ready  s}mpathy 
responds,  "  Graceful  passion  !  !  !  "  A  serious 
reader  of  our  commonplace  days  can  hardly 
repress  a  smile  at  this  enthusiasm  in  the  man 
of  fifty-two,  but  perhaps  the  smile  should  be  a 
sigh  that  we  are  incapable  of  these  festal  days  of 
fancy.  He  holds  out  well,  too,  through  the  six 
volumes,  embroidering  them  impartially  with 
his  notes.  He  discovers  that  "the  author  of 
these  tales  and  Ariosto  both  selected  China  as 
the  countr)'  of  the  most  beautiful  women  in 
the  world  I  Angelica  was  a  Chinese ; "  and  he 
remarks,  busy  editor  that  he  was.  upon  a  de- 
scription of  the  imprisonment  of  the  Sultan's 
son  :  "  Books,  and  an  old  tower,  and  cpiiet,  are 
not  the  worst  things  that  could  have  happened 
to  him." 

KiuLT  Hedir  savs  in  the  tale:  "It  is  n(^t 
enough  to  be  beautiful;  one's  actions  ought 
to  correspond. 

"  It  is  curicHis,"  sa\'s   Leigh    I  hint,  "that    this 


52  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


sentiment  is  so  often  lost  sight  of  by  others 
who  have  adventures  with  the  beautiful  fairies 
that  figure  in  so  many  of  these  tales.  The 
Eastern  beauty  seems  allowed  a  certain  quan- 
tum of  rage  and  cruelty  as  a  sort  of  moral  Pin- 
money  which  she  may  spend  without  being 
accountable  for  it."  "  This  picture,"  he  writes 
on  another  page,  "is  in  fine  keeping; — a  palace 
of  black  marble,  a  melancholy  lady  at  a  window, 
with  torn  garments,  and  a  black  cannibal  for 
the  master  of  the  house." 

"  An  Oone  !  "  he  exclaims  again.  "  An  addi- 
tion to  one's  stock  of  beings !  Pardon  me 
Oone  for  forgetting  thee.  The  pleasure  of 
seeming  to  see  thee  for  the  first  time  ought 
to  procure  my  forgiveness." 

But  I  must  have  done  with  copying  these 
tempting  notes,  tempting  because  I  seem  to 
see  Leigh  Hunt  again  as  I  knew  him  in  the 
flesh  and  heard  him  speak.  For  AH  Baba's 
sake,  however,  we  must  be  forgiven  one  more 
extract. 

"  Hail,  dear  old  story,  in  coming  to  thee 
again  for  I  know  not  the  whatth  time !  But 
why    must    our    friend    the    editor,    among    his 


Leiojh  Hunt  53 


other  changes  (all  painful  even  when  right),  be 
so  very  particular,  and  contemptuous  of  old 
associations,  as  to  think  it  necessary  to  con- 
vert the  word  '  thieves  '  into  '  robbers '  ?  '  The 
Forty  Thieves,'  that  was  the  good  old  sound, 
and  for  my  part  I  will  say  Forty  Thieves,  still, 
and  forever,  however  I  may  be  pre\'ailed  upon 
to  write  Alla-adi-Deen  for  Aladdin  and  Kum- 
mir  al  Zumman  for  Camaralzamcn  ;  and  I  do 
not  think  after  all  that  I  unll  do  that." 

Leigh   Hunt's  book,  "  A  Jar  of   Honey  fn^ii 
Mount   Hybla,"   is  an  excellent    illustration    of 
the  way  in    which  he    utilized   his  reading.     In 
the    very    first    essay    of    the    volume,  the    one 
entitled   "A  Blue  Jar  from   Sicily  and  a  l^rass 
Jar  from  the  'Arabian  Nights;'  and  what  came 
out   of  each,"  he   skilfully  draws   from   the   two 
jars,  the  one  of  blue  china,  which  recalled  Sicil- 
ian  seas,  and   the  one   of  brass,  which   recalled 
the    Ufreet,    such    an  epitome  of    the   spirit   of 
Theocritus  and  of  the  "Arabian   Nights"  that 
we    enter    ]ierfectly  for    the    moment    into    the 
circle  of  their  delicate   illusions. 

"  In  consequence  of  the  word   '  Sicilian,'  !)>•  a 
certain   magical   process   the   inside  of   our  blue 


54  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 

jar  became  enriched  beyond  its  honey.  .  .  . 
Theocritus  rose  before  us,  with  all  his  poetry. 
Johnson  says  that  Milton  and  his 
friend  were  not  '  nursed  on  the  same  hill,'  as 
represented  in  Lycidas ;  and  that  they  did  not 
'feed  the  same  flock.'  But  they  were,  and 
they  did ;  .  .  .  and  very  grievous  it  was 
for  them  to  be  torn  asunder,  to  be  deprived  by 
death  of  their  mutual  delight  in  Theocritus, 
and  Virgil,  and  Spenser."  Leigh  Hunt  found 
Theocritus  to  be  "a  son  of  /Etna— all  peace 
and  luxuriance  in  ordinary,  all  fire  and  wasting 
fury  when  he  chose  it.  He  was  a  genius  equally 
potent  and  universal."  In  support  of  his  doc- 
trine he  brings  both  virile  and  lovely  things 
from  the  blue  jar,  and  quotes  enough  to  per- 
suade us  to  his  belief.  There  is  a  translation 
of  "  The  Feast  of  Adonis,"  to  which  the 
Syracusan  gossips  go  and  listen  to  the  song 
of  a  Grecian  girl,  which  shows  his  poetic 
hand : 

"Go,  belov'd  Adonis,  go 
Year  by  year  thus  to  and  fro  ; 
Only  privileged   demigod  ; 
There  was  no  such   open   road 


Leigh  Hunt  55 


For  Atrides  ;  nor  the  great 

Ajax,  chief  infuriate  ; 

Nor  for   Hector,  noblest  once 

Of  his  mother's   twenty  sons  ; 

Nor  Patroclus,  nor   the  boy 

That  returned   from  taken   Troy  ; 

Nor  those  older  buried  bones, 

Lapiths  and   Deucalions  ; 

Nor  Pelopians,  and  their  boldest ; 

Nor  Pelasgians,  Greece's  oldest. 

Bless  us  then,  Adonis  dear. 

And  bring  us  joy  another  year. 

Dearly  hast  thou  come  again. 

And  dearly  shalt  be  welcomed  then." 

With  respect  to  the  brass  jar,  the  reader  is 
called  upon  to  remember  how  "  eighteen  hun- 
dred years  after  the  death  of  Solomon  a  certain 
fisherman,  after  throwing  his  nets  to  no  pur- 
pose, and  beginning  to  be  in  despair,  succeeded 
in  catching  a  jar  of  brass.  ...  He  took  a 
knife  and  worked  at  the  tin  cover  till  he  luul 
separated  it  from  the  jar.  Then  he  shook  the 
jar  to  tumble  out  whatever  might  be  in  it, 
and  found  in  it  not  a  thing.  So  he  marvelled 
with  extreme  ama/.ement.  But  present!)'  there 
came  out  of  the  jar  a    vapour,  and   it   rose   up 


56 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


towards  the  heavens,  and  reached  along  the 
face  of  the  earth  ;  and  after  this  the  vapour 
reached  its  height,  and  condensed  and  became 
—an  Ufreet.  .  .  ."  "Here,"  says  Leigh 
Hunt,  "is  an  Ufreet  as  high  as  the  clouds, 
fish  that  would  have  delighted  Titian  (they 
were  blue,  white,  yellow,  and  red),  a  lady,  full 


193 


POEMS  ATTBIBUTED  TO  CHAUCER. 


F'  falleth  for  a  gentleman 
To  say  the  best  that  he  can 
Alwaies  in  mannes  absence, 
And  the  sooth  in  his  presence. 

It  commeth  by  kind  of  gentil  blood 
To  cast  away  all  heavinesse, 
And  gader  togither  words  good, 
The  werk  of  wisdome  beareth  witnesse. 


One  of  Leigh   Hunt's   Annotations. 

dressed,  issuing  out   of  a   kitchen   wall,  a   kin 


half-turned  to  stone  by  his  wife,  a  throne  given 
to  a  fisherman,  and  a  half-dozen  other  phenom- 
ena, a//  resulting  from  one  poor  bra::cn  jar^  with 
which  indeed  his  own  fancy  has  achieved  w^on- 
ders. 

It  is  by  reading  after  Hunt  and  observing  the 
way  in  which  his  mind  played  over  a  variety  of 


Leigh  Hunt  57 


subjects,  that  we  recognize  the  truth  of  Car- 
lyle's  tribute  when  he  called  him  "A  man  of 
genius  in  a  very  strict  sense  of  the  word,  and 
in  all  the  senses  which  it  bears  or  implies." 

If  it  were  only  by  the  token  of  his  enthusi- 
asm, by  the  power  of  lighting  his  torch  at  the 
great  shrines  and  of  inspiring  others,  Leigh 
Hunt's  name  should  be  held  in  remembrance  ; 
and  it  is  with  a  feeling  akin  to  pity  that  we  see 
him  mentioned  in  a  late  life  of  John  Keats  as  a 
man  of  "second-rate  powers."  We  feel  pity 
for  a  writer  who,  in  unfolding  the  loveliness 
of  Keats's  genius,  has  allowed  his  eyes  to  be 
blinded  towards  his  friend  and  contemporary. 
That  Hunt's  gifts  were  second  to  those  of 
Keats,  no  one  can  deny ;  but  that  they  were 
second-rate  powers  in  themselves,  the  record 
which  he  has  left  in  his  Autobiography  and 
other   works   must    forever   disprove. 

Among  the  volumes  of  the  English  poets 
upon  our  shelf  formerly  belonging  to  Leigh 
Hunt,  wc  find  his  Chaucer  thoroughly  marked 
and  annotated.  "  He  was  one  of  my  best 
friends,"  he  said  once.  At  the  end  of  the 
eighth   volume  he  has  written  :  "  Finished  my 


58  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


third  regular  reading  of  this  great  poet  and 
good-hearted  man,  whom  I  admire  more  than 
ever."  The  Chaucer  notes  are  too  full  and  too 
minute  to  be  quoted,  especially  as  in  his  "  Spec- 
imens of  Chaucer,"  collected  in  "  The  Seer,"  we 
find  much    of    the    material   digested    and   pre- 


<u(jA  iw^^ 


Written  at  the   End   of  Leigh   Hunts  Copy  of  Chaucer. 

served.  It  is  seeing,  as  it  were,  the  first  rush 
of  feeling  in  which  the  notes  were  written 
which  makes  them  interesting  to  decipher,  but 
his  published  essays  contain  the  gist  of  his 
recorded   thought. 

His  copy  of  Ben  Jonson  is  a  quaint  posses- 
sion, full  of  new  suggestions.  But  Ben  Jonson 
with  Hunt's  notes  is  sufficient   for   a  paper  by 


Leigh  Hunt  51^ 

itself,  and  in  spite  of  the  temptation  to  follow 
his  lead  in  such  pleasant  pastures,  we  must  pass 
on  ;  yet  we  cannot  help  rejoicino-  with  him 
over  striking  passages,  as  we  quickl\-  turn  the 
leaves  ;  for  instance  where,  in  the  "  Masque  of 
Queens,"   he   marks  : 

"I   last   night  lay  all   alone 
On   the   ground  to   hear   the   mandrake  oroan  " 

I   find  one   profitable  bit  of   Hunt's  autobiog- 
raph)-  on  the  margin  of  his  copy  of   Boswell's 
Johnson.      He  says,  in  reference  to  a  passage 
describing    Johnson's    "dejection,    gloom,   and 
despair,"  "  I  had  it  myself  at  the  age  of  twxMity- 
one,    not    with    irritation    and    fretfulness,    but 
pure  gloom  and  ultra-thoughtfulness, — constant 
dejection;  during  which  however  I  could  trifle 
and  appear  cheerful  to  others.      I  got  rid  of  it 
by  horseback,  as  I  did  also  of  a  beating  of  the 
heart.     I  had  the  same  hypochondria  afterwards 
for  four    years    and   a    half   together.      In    both 
cases  I  have  no  doubt  that    indigestion  was  at 
the  bottom  of  the  disease,  aggravated  by  a  timid 
ultra-temperance.      I  never  ])ractisccl   llu'    l.ittrr 
again,  and   the  far   greater  part   of  ni)-  life  has 


6o  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


been  cheerful  in  the  midst  of  my  troubles.  I 
have,  however,  not  been  a  great  or  luxurious 
feeder,  and  I  have  been  cheerful  on  system  as 
well  as  inclination.  My  childhood  was  very 
cheerful  mixed  with  tenderness ;  and  I  had 
many  illnesses  during  infancy.  I  think  I  owe 
my  best  health  to  the  constant  and  temperate 
regimen  of  Christ  Hospital.  During  both  my 
illnesses  the  mystery  of  the  universe  perplexed 
me  ;  but  I  had  not  one  melancholy  thought  on 
religion." 

When  we  recall  Johnson's  criticisms  of  Mil- 
ton's poetry,  the  following  note  is  agreeable  to 
our  sense  of  truth.  It  is  written  upon  a  page 
where  Johnson  has  been  saying  that  "  had  Sir 
Isaac  Newton  applied  himself  to  poetry,  he 
could  have  made  a  fine  epic  poem  ;  /  could 
as  easily  apply  to  law  as  to  tragic  poetry." 
"  Surely  the  company  must  have  been  laugh- 
ing here,"  says  Leigh  Hunt.  "  Could  Johnson, 
who  had  no  ear,  have  made  a  musician  ?  With 
no  eye,  a  painter?" 

But  no  seductions  by  the  way  should  lead  to 
the  copying  of  these  notes  apart  from  the  text, 
especially  while  so  long  a  row  of  books  stands 


The   Grave   of  Sholloy,    in   Rnmo. 


Leigh  Hunt  63 


unmentioned  and   beckons  us  to  give  them   at 
least  a  nod  of   recognition. 

Of  Leigh  Hunt's  copy  of  Milton,  Mr.  Fields 
writes  :  "  I  am  pained  to  observe  in  m}-  friend's 
library  several  broken  sets  of  valuable  books. 
One  of  her  copies  of  Milton,  of  which  author 
she  has  some  ten  different  editions,  has  a  gap 
in  it,  which  probably  will  ne\-er  be  filled  again. 
Gone,  I  fear,  forever,  is  that  fourth  volume, 
rich  in  notes  in  the  handwriting  of  him  who 
sang  of   'Rimini'  and  '  Abou   Ben  Adhem.' " 

Boston's  long-loved  teacher,  George  B.  Emer- 
son, used  to  say  to  his  pupils,  "  Lending  books 
is  a  most  expensive  luxury."  In  consequence 
of  this  indulgent  temper,  Hunt's  Milton  stands 
shorn  of  the  fourth  volume,  containing  a  part 
of  "  Paradise  Lost."  The  x'olumes  that  remain 
are  much  interlinetl  and  commented,  but  wc 
miss  the  first  and  second  books  of  the  ureat 
poem  all  the  more  because  he  has  so  enriched 
the  portions  that  are  left  to  us.  "L'AUegro" 
and  "II  Penseroso"  he  considers  "the  hap- 
piest of  Alilton's  productions."  We  can  easil)' 
understantl  how  congenial  their  loveliness 
wouki    be   to   Leigh   Hunt.      lie   especially  ob- 


64  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


serves   in  "  L'Allegro  "  the  passage  containing 

the  lines : 

"  While  the  ploughman   near  at  hand 
Whistles  o'er  the  furrowed  land, 
And  the   milkmaid  singeth  blithe, 
And  the  mower  whets  his  scythe, 
And  every  shepherd  tells   his  tale 
Under  the  hawthorn  in  the  dale." 

Warton  in  a  note  reminds  us  that  the  "  late 
ingenious  Mr.  Headley  suggested  that  the 
word  tale  does  not  here  imply  stories  told  by 
shepherds,  but  that  it  is  a  technical  term  for 
numbering  sheep."  Leigh  Hunt  adds:  "This 
explanation  would  probably  be  rejected  by 
most  young  readers  at  first,  as  interfering  with 
their  Arcadian  luxuries ;  and  might  even  be 
unkindly  regarded  by  older  ones  for  the  same 
reason  :  but  it  will  be  adopted  by  every  grown 
reader  of  poetry  at  last." 

The  line 

*'  Bosom'd  high  in  tufted  trees," 

was  evidently  a  favorite  ;    also  those, 

"  Untwistincr  all  the  chains  that  tie 
The  hidden  souls   of  harmony." 


Leigh  Hunt  65 


Of  "II  Penseroso "  he  says:  "This  word 
ought  al\va}'s  to  be  spelt  pcnsicroso,  and  not 
in  its  present  way,  which  is  certainly  not  the 
common  one  with  Italian  writers,  and  I  am 
told  is  not  to  be  found   in  them  at  all." 

Many  books  still  look  at  us  from  Leigh 
Hunt's  group,  and  there  are  interesting  things 
for  book-lovers  still  to  be  found  among  them. 
There  is  his  copy  of  Plato's  "Republic;"  of 
Emerson's  "  English  Traits,"  the  notes  in  which 
gave  Emerson  himself  much  amusement ;  Car- 
lyle's  "  French  Revolution,"  and  others.  Sadi, 
and  the  English  poets,  and  Sterne  were  all  evi- 
dently favorite  reading.  There  is  a  freshness 
like  that  of  a  June  rose  in  Hunt's  delight  in 
good  books  to  the  very  end,  and  the  same 
freshness  is  to  be  found  in  his  own  work.  We 
are  sorry  to  think  that  he  is  not  much  read 
or  known  by  the  younger  generation,  and 
perhaps  if  it  were  understood  how  little  the 
term  "  old-fashioned  "  applies  to  him,  he  \\()uld 
be  more  eagerly  sought.  Many  a  young  lover 
of  books  would  sympathize  with  the  writer,  if 
the  pages  of  "  Imagination  .ind  h'anc}'  "  were 
once  opened  in   a  quiet  corner. 


66  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


He  was  himself  compact  of  imagination  and 
fancy,  and  his  autobiography  is  a  book  which 
is  pretty  sure  to  be  safe  against  the  great 
robber  Time.  Whatever  detraction  Leigh 
Hunt  suffered,  the  bird  still  sang  on,  in  spite 
of  finding  himself  caged  and  in  spite  of  the 
clipping  of  his  wings. 

His  father  was  a  British  colonist  in  America 
at  the  time  of  our  war  for  independence,  and 
took   the   side   of   the  loyalists  with  such  fervor 
that   he   nearly  lost   his  life.     He   fled   to    Bar- 
badoes,   and    afterward    to    England,  where   he 
lived    a    strange  wandering    life  with    his    wife 
and   children.      One   may   say  with   truth    that 
Leigh    Hunt's   misfortunes   began    long    before 
he  was  born.     His  life  was  in   strange  contrast 
to  that  of  the  other  distinguished  poets  of  his 
time.       He  had,  what  they  had  not,  a  hand-to- 
hand    fight   with    poverty   from    the    beginning 
to   the   end   of   his   long   life,  and   although  he 
was  the  intimate  friend  of  Byron  and  Shelley 
and   Keats,  and  well  known    to  the  rest  of  that 
shining    group,    his    "problems"    were    unlike 
theirs,  and   his  term  of  struggle  one  that  lasted 
into    old    age.      They   died    early,    having  won 


Leigh  Hunt  67 


name  and  fame;  but  Leigh  Hunt  drank  the 
bitter  cup  of  existence  to  the  dregs.  All  tlie 
more,  therefore,  in  spite  of  the  harsliness  of 
personal  and  Hterary  criticism,  it  is  a  genuine 
happiness  to  the  reader  of  to-day  to  discover 
a  few  beautiful  and  enduring  poems  wliicli 
will  embalm  his  name  forever;  and  still  further, 
to  recognize  his  leadership  in  letters,  by  which 
other  men  are  brought  to  the  fountain  of  in- 
spiration and  sustainment. 


EDINBURGH 


¥ 


ipmiifjj,'  'iLi\Mi'rv'i""i'j 


1 


m 


Scott.     (From  an  original  unpublished  drawing  in  chalk   by  Stuart  Newton,  now  in  possession  of 

Mrs.  George   D.  Howe.) 


EDINBURGH 

As  wc  find  oiirseh-cs  quittinij  one  shelf  of  old 
books  and  turning  to  another,  we  seem  for  the 
moment  to  be  leaving  behind  us  Leigh  Hunt, 
Shelle)%  and  Keats,  three  names  to  conjure 
with,  tliree  presences  from  which  we  turn  un- 
willingly. But  near  b\'  we  see  the  names  (we 
M'ere  on  the  point  of  sa)'ing  the  faces,  so  real 
these  familiars  are  to  us)  of  the  men  ^\•ho  have 
made  Edinburgh  forever  one  of  the  best  be- 
lo\'ed   of  all   cities. 

Samuel  Rogers  once  said :  "The  most  mem- 
orable day,  perhaps,  ^hich  I  ever  passed  was 
in  Edinburgh — a  Sundaw  when  after  breakfast- 
ing with  Robertson,  1  heard  liim  preach  in 
the  forenoon,  and  l^lair  in  the  afternoon,  tlun 
took  coffee  with  tin-  I'iozzis,  and  supped  witli 
Adam  Smith." 

During  more  generations  than  we  can  reckon 


72  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 

here,  Edinburgh  held  her  high  preeminence,  and 
if  the  tide  of  life  has  swept  at  length  too 
strongly  toward  London,  the  maelstrom  of  Eng- 
land, a  brooding  mantle  of  remembrance  will 
always  hang  over  Edinburgh  and  make  her 
landscape  beautiful.  A  glance  at  any  time 
toward  this  corner  of  the  library  will  bring 
back  the  face  and  voice  of  Dr.  John  Brown, 
the  author  of  "  Spare  Hours,"  of  "  Rab  and 
his  Friends,"  and  of  "Pet  Marjorie."  The 
book  that  stands  nearest  to  our  hand  happens 
to  be  a  copy  of  Byron's  "  Don  Juan,"  and  I  can 
see  the  book  again  as  I  saw  it  first,  standing  in 
Dr.  Brown's  library  at  23  Rutland  Street,  the 
spot  which  of  late  years,  after  the  home  of  Sir 
Walter  Scott  at  39  Castle  Street,  has  become 
the  place  in  all  Edinburgh  where  the  feet  of  pil- 
grims to  literary  shrines  love  best  to  linger.  It 
was  a  true  doctor's  house,  and  reminded  me  of  a 
New  England  Boston  home  of  thirty  years  ago. 
The  humanities  were  all  alive  in  it,  and  the 
de-humanizing  quality  of  much  of  our  high  art 
in  drawing-rooms  had  not  found  its  way  there. 
Plenty  of  books  covered  the  walls  on  their  plain 
unenclosed   shelves,   and  other  literary   curiosi- 


Edinburgh  73 


ties  besides  the  "Don  Juan"  had  found  an 
appreciative  resting-place  upon  them.  This 
volume  is  indeed  a  curiosity.  On  the  side 
is  printed   in  gold  letters : 

Lord   B}'ron's  Copy. 

Don   Juan 
Cantos  III.  IV.  V. 

and  two  branches  of  laurel  cross  their  stems 
beneath  the  inscription. 

Inside  Dr.  Brown  has  written  his  own  name 
and  the  following  words : 

"August  1864  given  me  by  CaroHne  Scott. 
June   1 8th   1869 

To  James  T.    I'iclds 

from   his   fricntl 

J.    H." 

Turning  the  leaf  I   find  still  another  inscrip- 
tion,   IS  follows: 

"  The  ^\•riting  on   the  opposite  page  is  by  the 
hand   of   Lord   l^\'ron. 

John    ?ilurra)-   Jan    25    39" 


74  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


And  on  the  opposite  leaf  Byron  has  writ- 
ten : 

"  The  Publisher  is  requested  to  reprint  (pro- 
vided the  occasion  should  occur)  from  tJiis  copy 
— as  the  one  most  carefully  gone  over  by  the 
Authour.  The  Authour  repeats  (as  before)  that 
the  former  impressions  (from  whatever  cause) 
are  full  of  errours.  And  he  further  adds  that 
he  doth  kindly  trust — with  all  due  deference 
to  those  superior  persons — the  publisher  and 
printer — that  they  w'ill  in  future — less  misspell 
— misplace — mistake — and  mis-everything,  the 
humbled  M.S.S.  of  their  humble  servant. 

Oct^  26'^    1821  " 

After  this  ungraceful  peroration  Byron  pro- 
ceeds to  make  such  corrections  as  seem  good  to 
him  throughout  the  pages  with  his  own  hand. 

As  I  have  said,  there  were  many  other  inter- 
esting books  in  Dr.  Brown's  own  collection,  for 
he  was  the  true  son  of  his  father,  into  whose 
reverent  hands  such  things  were  always  gravi- 
tating— but  he  was  also  one  of  the  most  gener- 
ous  of  men,  as  those  of  us  have  good  reason  to 
know  who  look  over  this  shelf  of  books.      He 


<n,       ^--» 


',/>u.^  ^5t_-e^^ 


DON  JUAN. 
/f;Z   ^./^^  -  -^  7^^    ^, 

-u.ji^'^C     *-- ^  '^'>^  '^'-^  ^S^'  ^ 

A  Note  to  his  Publisher,   John  Murray,   written   by  Lord  Byron   in  his  copy  of 
"  Don  Juan."     [Reduced  fac-simile.] 


76  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


was  aware  what  he  was  doing  when  he  gave 
away  one  of  his  treasures,  his  regard  for  them 
being  an  inheritance  not  only  from  his  father 
but  also  from  his  great-grandfather,  the  famous 
John  Brown  of  Haddington.  Chief  among  his 
treasures  he  held  to  be  a  certain  Greek  Testa- 
ment, concerning  which  he  has  said :  "  I  pos- 
sess, as  an  heirloom,  the  New  Testament,  which 
my  father  fondly  regarded  as  the  one  his  grand- 
father, when  a  herd-laddie,  got  from  the  Profes- 
sor who  heard  him  ask  for  it,  and  promised  him 
it  if  he  could  read  a  verse." 

This  chief  possession,  inherited  thus  directly, 
was  accompanied  by  others  from  the  paternal 
shelves.  He  tells  us  that  his  father  began  to 
collect  books  when  he  was  about  twelve  years 
old,  and  that  among  his  treasures  were  "  Ulric 
von  Hutton's  autograph  on  Erasmus's  beauti- 
ful folio  Greek  Testament,  and  John  Howe's 
(spelt  How)  on  the  first  edition  of  Milton's 
Speech  on  Unlicensed  Printing ;  "  also  a  very 
interesting  copy  of  Baxter's  Life  and  Times 
which  had  belonged  to  Anna  Countess  of 
Argyll,  with  a  note  in  it  of  historic  value,  be- 
sides her  autograph.    The  old  story  thus  renews 


I, 


Rev.   John   Brown,   father  of  Dr.   Brown. 


78  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


itself,  and  we  must  go  behind  a  perfected  per- 
sonality like  Dr.  John  Brown's  in  order  to 
understand  it.  Even  as  I  sit,  with  the  photo- 
graph before  me  of  his  full-length  figure 
holding  his  dog,  and  the  memory  of  his  pres- 
ence clearly  before  that  "  inner  eye,"  the  pen 
still  delays  and  hesitates  in  the  attempt  to 
describe  him  as  he  was.  The  fine  skull,  the 
tender  in-seeing  eyes,  the  firm  mouth  yet 
ready  to  break  into  fun  with  one  of  the  earliest 
or  latest  Scottish  anecdotes,  all  this  we  see  and 
hear,  and  }-et  fail  to  portray  him  to  those  who 
knew  him  not.  One  of  the  books  which  he 
gave  us  in  the  early  days  of  our  friendship  was 
the  biography  of  his  father  by  Dr.  Cairns,  a 
book  which  true  lovers  of  biography  even  at 
this  date  may  pore  over  with  absorbing  inter- 
est ;  and  among  his  own  published  papers, 
as  we  all  remember,  is  a  letter  of  gratitude 
to  Dr.  Cairns  containing  reminiscences  of  his 
father,  which  came  too  late  to  be  included 
in  Dr.  Cairns'  book.  In  these  we  find  the 
seed-grain  of  much  that  is  in  his  own  nature, 
the  foundation  of  his  own  faiths  and  tastes. 
Even   in   the    portrait  of    his    father    we    see, 


Dr.  John   Brown  of  Edinburgh.     (After  a  photograph  from  lito.) 


Edinburgh  8[ 


though  they  were  such  ch'ffcrent  men,  a  great 
hkcness.  The  famous  preacher  and  scholar  had 
not  the  brawny  Scottish  physique  whicli  might 
well  serve  a  man  ready  to  engage  in  this  most 
difficult  of  all  professions,  but  he  possessed  on 
the  contrary  a  constitutional  refinement  of 
body  as  well  as  of  mind,  and  was  capable 
of  intense  self-excitement  and  of  consequent 
silence  and  self-withdrawal,  if  not  of  actual 
depression.  "  There  was  a  fountain  of  ten- 
derness in  his  nature,"  writes  Dr.  Cairns,  "  as 
well  as  a  sweep  of  impetuous  indignation." 
Might  this  not  be  said  of  the  author  of  "  Rab  " 
as  well?  "  The  union  of  these  ardent  elements 
.  .  .  not  untouched  with  melancholy,"  the 
biographer  continues,  "with  the  patience  of  the 
scholar  and  the  sobriety  of  the  critic  formed 
the  singularity  and  almost  the  anomal}'  of  his 
personal  character,"  This  too  was  the  nature 
f)f  his  son,  but  there  was  also  a  lo\'e  for  others, 
a  homely  drawing  to  his  kind  whicli  distin- 
guished him  from  his  father,  and  which  en- 
deared him  in  turn,  not  alone  to  those  who 
knew  him,  but  to  all  who  read  liini.  lie 
speaks  of  remembering  well  how  his  father 
6 


82  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


would  sit  up  by  night,  after  his  mother's  death, 
and  pore  over  his  books  while  he  lay  tucked 
away  in  the  warm  bed.  "  My  father's  bed  was 
in  his  study,  a  small  room,  with  a  very  small 
grate.  ...  I  can  remember  often  awaking 
far  on  in  the  night  or  morning,  and  seeing  that 
keen,  beautiful,  intense  face  bending  over  these 
Rosenmiillers  and  Ernestis,  and  Storrs  and 
Kuehnoels — the  fire  out,  and  the  gray  dawn 
peering  through  the  window  ;  and  when  he 
heard  me  move,  he  would  speak  to  me  in  the 
foolish  words  of  endearment  my  mother  was 
wont  to  use,  and  come  to  bed  and  take  me, 
warm  as  I  was,  into  his  cold  bosom." 

"  Warm  as  he  was  :  "  perhaps  these  words 
describe  his  nature  better  than  more  studied 
phrase.  He  seemed  born  to  cherish  this 
warmth  both  for  man  and  beast,  and  when  he 
grew  to  manhood  he  loved  to  gather  the  lonely 
and  the  suffering  to  his  breast,  as  his  father  once 
gathered  him.  And  when  Dr.  Brown  quotes 
Sir  Walter  Scott  calling  for  "  Pet  Marjorie," 
and  saying,  "  Where  are  ye,  my  bonnie  wee 
coodlin'  doo,"  we  feel  that  he  himself  would 
have    called  Marjorie    with    those    words,   and 


■WS^SyS^WIgWIWJJ^iWWonam 


'Ui^//,'/'^y^^^. 


•■■i-     (Aft.,i   tM.,-    water-color  i 


of  David  Douglas,   Esq..   Edinburgh.) 


Isabella  Koith.     By  conin nt 


i 


Edinburgh  85 


would  have  gathered  her  so  into  his  own  bosom. 
Cahn  and  quiet  as  Dr.  Brown  was  in  appear- 
ance, a  critic,  too,  by  education,  a  man  subject 
to  dark  periods  of  depression  during  the  last 
twenty  years  of  his  life,  no  one  could  approach 
him,  either  man  or  dog,  without  that  sense  of 
a  warm  human  breast  open  and  ready  to  shelter 
and  make  warm. 

One    day    in    the  early   summer  of   i860,  we 
took    the    morning    train   from    Edinburgh    to 
Melrose.     A  heavy  shower  was  falling  that  ren- 
dered   the    prospect     for    a    day  out  of    doors 
rather   disappointing;     but   we  were  so    full  of 
interest  in   everything   around  us  that  we  took 
little  heed  of  the  weather.     At  one  of   the  way 
stations,  a  kindly,  breezy  man  leaped  hurriedly 
into  our  carriage,  nodding   to   us   in    a  cheerful 
fashion,   and    then    almost    without    pause    he 
be^an  a   friendly  talk,  catching   speedily  at  the 
idea  of  what  would  chielly  interest  us  as  Amer- 
icans.    "Can  you  tell  us  anything  of  a  man   in 
Edinburgh    who    has    written    a    book    called 
'Horai    Subseciv^e'?"    we   asked.     "Oh,    yes," 
he  replied,  "  he    is   my  brother,  and    1  will    give 
you  a  n(jtc  to  him  with  pleasure."      Hut    almost 


86  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


as  suddenly  as  he  came  he  leaped  out  of  the 
carriage  again  and  was  away,  for  he  too  was  a 
bus\'  physician  like  the  Edinburgh  doctor.  At 
evening,  however,  when  our  sight-seeing  was 
finished  and  we  were  about  to  return  to  Edin- 
burgh, we  saw  him  waiting  at  the  station  with 
a  "  good  speed  "  for  us  and  with  the  letter  in 
his  hand. 

And  thus  we  found  ourselves  shorth'  after  at 
Dr.  Brown's  tea-table,  with  the  family,  not  for- 
getting his  friendly  doggie   "  Dick." 

I  can  well  recall  how  rich  we  felt  as  we  came 
away  after  that  first  visit  ;  rich  first  of  all  in 
his  friendship,  and  again  rich  in  the  memory  of 
good  things  which  had  fallen  from  his  lips,  rich 
above  all  with  that  sense  of  a  generous  nature 
which  gives  and  gives  and  still  hath  all.  I 
remember  that  Mr.  David  Douglas  was  present 
and  helped  to  make  the  occasion  agreeable,  for 
Dr.  Brown  was  a  man  of  "  infinite  humor  "  and 
full  of  anecdote,  and  he  and  Mr.  Douglas 
added  Scottish  wit  to  Scottish  tale  till  the  time 
could  hold  no  more. 

Even  then  a  great  shadow  had  fallen  upon 
Dr.  Brown,  and    the   new   thoughts  which  were 


Edinburgh  87 


awakened  by  this  visit  and  the  little  excitement 
seem  to  have  been  helpful  to  him.  He  wrote 
two  letters  on  the  following  day  to  his  new 
friends,  in  the  first  of  which  he  confesses  to 
have  lain  awake  a  good  part  of  the  night  think- 
ing over  many  things,  but  adds,  in  his  own 
kindly  fashion,  "  we  had  not  been  so  happy  for 
many  a  day." 

In  this  same  letter  he  adds  something  which 
may  be  considered  a  dramatic  episode  indeed 
for  autograph  lovers:  "  I  am  quite  sorry  that  I 
cannot  give  you  the  manuscript  of  '  Rab.'  Only 
three  days  ago  I  found  it  in  my  desk  and 
threw  it  into  the  waste  basket,  and  by  this  time 
it  is  in  ashes  and   up  the  chimnc)-." 

It  was  not  until  January  of  the  following 
year  that  he  wrote  to  us  about  his  wife's  health 
in  unmistakable  terms.  He  said  :  "  My  dearest 
is  still  with  us,  but  going  down  more  and  more 
into  darkness;  sweet  and  good  ami  full  of 
love,  but  almost  beyond  the  reach  of  our  love. 
In  the  story  of  Rab  the  words,  '  Why  was  that 
LTentle,  modest,  sweet  woman,  clean  and  lova- 
ble,  condemned  by  God  to  bear  such  a  bunlL-n,' 
are  her  own.     They  occurred  in   a  letter  to  me 


88  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


about  Ailie  ;  how  terribly  true  they  now  are  of 
her  own  beloved  self.  .  .  .  I  go  about  in  a 
dream,  but  the  stroke  will  come  some  day  and 
awake  me." 

Two  or  three  months  later  he  again  referred 
to  "  the  great  sorrow  under  which  we  lie,  in  the 
loss  of  the  reason  of  my  dear  wife.  She  was 
away  from  us  when  we  saw  you.  .  .  .  One 
of  the  last  things  my  dear  wife  enjoyed,  and 
parts  of  which  she  repeats,  was  Whittier's 
'Witch's  Daughter.' 

"  Often  I  heard  her  saying,  gently  to  herself : 

'  And  the  winds  whispered 
It  is  well.'" 

Among  the  books  given  to  us  by  Dr.  Brown 
are  two  volumes  containing  the  Essays  and 
Lectures  of  his  cousin,  Samuel  Brown.  It  was 
through  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  that  his  name 
was  first  made  known  to  readers  in  Boston. 
Mr.  Emerson  possibly  became  acquainted  with 
Samuel  Brown  as  early  as  the  time  of  his  first 
visit  to  Carlyle,  for  the  father  of  Samuel  was  a 
distinguished  man  in  his  day,  a  "  Secession " 
minister  and   a   native   of   Haddington. 


Edinburgh  89 


I  well  remember  the  sense  of  awe  which 
came  over  me  when  Emerson  described  this 
brilliant  creature,  of  whom  his  cousin  says : 
"  His  letters  and  his  journal,  and  above  all, 
his  living  voice  and  presence,  could  alone  tell 
what  was  best  in  him  ;  there  was  a  swiftness 
and  a  brightness  about  his  mind  and  its  ex- 
pression such  as  we  never  before  witnessed  ; 
its  penetrative,  transmitting  power  seemed  like 
that  of  lightning  in  its  speed  and  keenness. 
With  this  brightness,  and  immediateness  and 
quickness  of  mind,  there  was  great  subtlet)- — a 
power  of  expressing  almost  impossible  thoughts, 
of  working  upon  invisible  points,  which  was 
quite  marvellous — ;  .  .  .  a  venatic  instinct 
for  first  principles,  a  sort  of  i)ointing  at  them 
as  a  dog  does  at  game ;  '  that  instinctive  grasp,' 
as  has  been  finely  said,  '  wliich  the  health)' 
imagination  takes  of  possible  truth  ; '  and  along 
with  this  a  hard,  remorseless  logic,  and  a 
genuine  love  and  practice  of  method,  in  its 
Coleridgean  sense,  as  distinguished  from  sys- 
tem ^ 

All  this  Emerson  had  recognized  in  the  man. 
and  he  joined   in   the  ranks  of  those  who  stood 


90  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


about  Samuel  Brown,  waiting  the  success  which 
seemed  sure  to  follow  his  scientific  theory  and 
labors.  He  was  candidate  for  the  chair  of 
Chemistry  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh  when 
he  was  twenty-six  years  old,  but  before  the 
time  for  his  election  arrived  a  large  company  of 
learned  men  were  invited  to  witness  his  experi- 
ments to  prove  "  the  proposition  of  the  isom- 
erism of  carbon  and  silicon."  I  can  never 
forget  Emerson's  manner,  the  pain  and  wonder 
with  which  he  described  the  utter  failure  of 
these  experiments.  It  was  a  failure  which 
meant  ruin  to  this  fair  fabric  of  a  life.  All  his 
learning  and  noble  conduct  were  blasted  with  a 
breath.  It  was  doubtless  unjust,  it  was  terrible, 
but  it  was  the  decision  of  the  world,  and  it  was 
final.  Samuel  Brown  died  at  the  early  age  of 
thirty-nine,  withdrawn  from  public  life,  and  suf- 
fering great  physical  agony.  Dr.  Brown  says  : 
"  Time  and  the  hour,  which  brings  the  sun  up 
into  the  heavens,  will  doubtless  bring  him  like- 
wise into  his  just  place.  But  we  cannot  help 
recording  our  unvarying  confidence  in  the  specu- 
lative truth  of  his  doctrine,  and  his  own  solemn 
assertion    of    this    with   his   dying    hand  in    his 


Edinburgh  91 

private  journal ;  and  tliou^h  we  speak  as  un- 
learned, we  must  affirm  our  orii,n'nal  conviction 
of  the  essential  truth  of  his  doctrine  of  tlie  unity 
of  matter,  and  consequent!}-  of  the  possible, 
and,  it  may  be,  provable,  transmutability  of 
the  so-called   elementary  bodies." 

Not    a    word    is    said     in    print    anywhere,    I 
believe,  of  this  great  sorrow,  for  such   it  was  to 
a  large   Edinburgh   circle,  but   we  can  read   be- 
tween   the   lines   and    understand   the   scene  as 
Emerson   described   it.     The  contrast   is   sharp 
indeed    between    the    picture    of    the    defeated 
scientist  and  the  man  of  whom  Dr.  Ih-own  says: 
"  It   would    not    be  possible  to   indicate   to  any 
one  A\ho  never  saw  him,  or  heard  his  voice,  and 
came    under    the    power    of    his  personalit}-,   in 
what    lay    the    peculiarity    of    Samuel    Brown's 
genius; — all     who    knew    him,    knew    it, — none 
who     did    not,    can.       lie    was    not    so    much 
cleverer    or    deeper    tlian    most    men, — he    was 
quite   different;   it   was  as   if  a   new  Hown- had 
grown    up,  A\]iich    no   one   ever  before  saw,  and 
whicli   no  one  looks  for  again." 

All  this  Emerson  had  seen,  antl  none  had  felt 
more   deeply;   but  later  came   that   contrasting 


92  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


hour  of  the  self-imposed  test  and  the  sudden 
failure  which,  for  reasons  inexplicable  to  us 
now,  bore  a  sense  almost  of  disgrace,  so  high 
had  been  the  hope,  so  futile  the  attempt  to 
prove  it.  But  Samuel  Brown  still  had  great 
happiness  left  him  in  his  private  life.  He  had 
married  his  cousin,  "■  and  this,"  writes  Dr. 
Brown,  "  was  his  greatest  earthly  blessing." 
To  her  we  owe  these  books.  They  are  doubt- 
less helping  to  pave  the  way  for  other  discover- 
ers, but  much  of  the  great  learning  they  con- 
tain must  be  already  as  matter  sloughed  off 
from  the  new  creature. 

Dr.  Brown  continually  recurs  to  this  brilliant 
frustrated  career.  He  says  in  one  of  his  letters  : 
"  I  send  you  a  notice  I  wrote  for  T/ic  Scotsman 
at  the  time  of  George  Wilson's  death.  The 
part  about  Samuel  Brown  will  interest  you." 
And  again  :  "  You  will  see  in  the  article  on  my 
cousin  in  the  North  British  an  extract  from  a 
Diary  he  kept.  I  believe  that  Diary,  if  Mrs. 
Brown  would  permit  its  publication,  would 
give  the  world  a  better  idea  of  what  Samuel 
Brown's  genius  was  than  an\-thing  of  his  that 
has  hitherto  been  published.     .     .     .      Here  he 


Edinburgh  93 


was  too  much  the  prophet  at  home,  and  there- 
fore not  honored  as  I  think  he  deserved.    .    .    ." 

There  is  still  another  book  on  the  shelf  con- 
nected with  the  old  Scottish  days  and  Dr. 
Brown.  It  is  a  discourse  by  Nathaniel  Cul- 
verwel,  edited  by  the  Rev.  John  Brown  ;  a 
book  of  which  Sir  William  Hamilton  said  that 
"  Culverwel  did  not  deserve  the  oblivion  into 
which  he  has  fallen."  Perhaps  not,  but  has  the 
world  discovered  any  method  for  recovering 
whatever  may  fall  into  the  waters  of  oblivion  ? 
Dr.  Brown  wrote  of  it:  "If  you  can  find  a 
young  Jonathan  Edwards,  he  would  relish  the 
non-conformist,  neo-Platonist."  But  we  have 
not  found  him  yet,  and  the  compact  volume 
stands  gathering  dust  to  dust. 

As  the  mists  and  dark  gathered  about  Dr. 
Brown's  later  years  he  wrote  fewer  letters,  and 
though  always  with  the  same  affcctionatcness 
yet  with  a  cloud  over  his  spirits  from  which  he 
sometimes  found   it   impossible  to  rall\'. 

"I  am  doing  nothing  now,"  he  wrote,  "but 
drudge  and  doctor — my  little  vein  seems  worketi 
out,  and  I  am  too  much  iiivoK'ed  in  (lail\-  work, 
and  too  dull   and  careless  now  lli.it  ui\-  coiupan- 


94  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 

ion  is  sone,  to  make  myself  do  anything  with 
m\-  brain."  But  this  mood  was  disease  in 
part ;  occasionally  the  clouds  would  lift,  and  he 
would  write  in  a  more  cheerful  vein.  Of  Dr. 
Holmes  he  says  in  one  of  his  letters  :  "  If 
Voltaire  had  been  good  and  a  New  Englander 
he  would  have  thus  written.  There  is  the 
same  mastery  of  style,  which  means  not  only 
.^  point — but  means  the  point  of  a  pyramid, 
the  broader  the  deeper  in.  ...  I  wonder 
how  that  brain  burns  so  unconsumingly ;  is 
there    a    bit    of    asbestos    in    the   hippocampus 

minor  ?  " 

In  a  yet  gayer  mood  he  wrote  again  of  his 
does:  "Don  has  been  succeeded  by  a  huge 
young  English  mastiff  with  a  tawny  hide,  close 
and  short  like  a  lion's.  A  muzzle  as  if  dipped 
in  ink,  and  a  pedigree  as  thoroughbred  as  Lord 
Derby's.  I  call  him  Kent,  partly  from  his 
county — partly  because  I  always  think  Lear's 
faithful  servant  was  a  sort  of  human  mastiff. 
He  is  of  Lord  Kingsdowne's  breed,  and  as 
good  a  dog  as  his   Lordship  is  a  lawyer." 

It  is  hard  to  cut  the  letters  of  a  friend,  and 
harder    yet    where    the    subjects    of    which    he 


Edinburs;h  95 


writes  are  so  full  of  interest  to  many  people, 
but  his  own  books  recall  us  to  the  shehes 
where  the  various  editions  of  "  Hora^  Sub- 
secivas  "  are  to  be  found. 

These  "Spare  Hours"  of  a  physician's  life 
are,  after  all,  the  work  by  which  he  will  be 
remembered  in  this  world.  The  power  and 
tenderness  of  the  written  page  touch  men  from 
afar  as  his  healing  hand  could  touch  them  in 
the  chamber  of  suffering.  These  are  all  the 
world  can  have  who  did  not  know  him,  antl 
how  much  they  are  !  these  "bits  "  and  "  scraps," 
as  he  so  often  called  them.  His  larger  record 
lies  hidden  among  the  secrets  to  be  revealed  in 
the  Great   Future. 

A  smaller  book  next  attracts  our  attention, 
in  dark  covers  neatly  lettered,  "  Lights  and 
Shadows  of  Scottish  Life."  It  is  a  volume  of 
brief  sketches  by  John  Wilson,  and  one  wlu'ch 
will  outlive  many  of  the  more  voluminous 
books  of  his  later  years.  The  name  of  l-'rancis 
W.  r.  Greenwood  is  inscribed  in  a  careful  hand- 
writing within,  with  the  date  1823.  l^ostonians 
will  not  love  this  c<jpy  the  less  that  one  of  her 


9b  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


most  spiritual  and  best  beloved  ministers  of 
the  old  King's  Chapel  owned  it,  loved  it,  and 
turned  its  pages. 

"Christopher  North"  was  one  of  the  most 
striking  figures  which  even  the  streets  of  Edin- 
burgh,  wonted  to  the  figures  of  unusual  men, 
had  ever  seen.  De  Quincey  used  to  say  of  him 
"  that  it  was  good  to  dwell  in  his  shadow." 
Mr.  Fields  said  that  the  Opium-eater  being 
one  of  the  smallest  of  men  in  stature,  and 
Wilson  taller  and  broader  than  his  race,  he 
supposed  the  little  man  felt  a  physical  security 
beside  him.  "  I  remember,"  he  continued, 
"  that  De  Quincey  described  to  me  a  visit  he 
once  made  with  the  Professor  to  Paris.  His 
account  was  full  of  droll  situations  ;  and  one  of 
the  incidents  left  on  my  mind  was  the  recital 
of  an  encounter  between  young  Wilson  and  a 
Frenchman.  '  We  were  sitting  in  the  theatre 
together,'  said  De  Quincey,  '  when  to  my  sur- 
prise a  quarrel  arose  between  my  companion 
and  a  stranger  on  the  other  side  next  him. 
The  Frenchman  became  so  obnoxious  that 
Wilson  begged  him  to  be  quiet  until  the  play 
was    over,   when    they   could    step   outside   the 


Edinburgh 


97 


,1    I 


if  .i> 


!i^' 


i 


John  Wilson   ("Christopher  North"). 

theatre  into  an  alley  hard  b\',  and  settle  the 
dispute.'  'And  did  they  <;<)  out  and  arranL;e 
the  luisunderstandint' ?  '  I  asked.     '()h,  \'es,'saitl 

7 


98  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


De  Quincey.  '  And  what  was  the  result  ?'  De 
Quincey  looked  up  in  his  mild  and  pensive  way 
and  replied  with  great  solemnity  and  compos- 
ure of  muscle,  '  The  Professor  closed  both  the 
little  Frenchman's  eyes,  and  thus  eliminating 
his  vision,  the  combat  ended.'  " 

John  Wilson  was  one  of  the  few  great  men 
whom  Mr,  Fields  saw  in  his  first  boyish  run 
through  Europe.  The  young  American  had 
already  acquainted  himself  with  the  incompar- 
able tales  contained  in  this  small  volume,  and 
probably  suspected  their  author  to  be  the 
editor  of  Blackzvood's  Magazine.  He  appears 
to  have  known  him  also  even  then  to  be  the 
writer  of  the  "  Noctes."  The  Professor  re- 
ceived him  with  great  kindness  at  his  house 
in  Edinburgh,  and  in  the  course  of  the  inter- 
view undertook  to  show  his  young  guest  how 
the  Irish  shillalah  should  be  used.  Finding 
his  movements  circumscribed  and  the  wild 
fling  rather  dangerous  in  his  study,  he  opened 
the  front  door,  and  bidding  his  guest  follow 
him  to  the  sidewalk,  then  and  there  proceeded 
to  lay  about  him  with  the  stick,  entirely  oblivi- 
ous of  passers-by  and  their  comments.      "  Chris- 


Edinburgh  99 


topher  North  "  was  always  free  and  unconscious 
in  his  bearing  and  appearance.  He  usually 
wore  a  flannel  shirt  entirely  open  at  the  throat, 
and  when  he  was  among  his  Westmoreland 
hills  the  countr\-  people  often  met  him  of  a 
morning  with  even  his  shirt  thrown  back  from 
his  brawny  shoulders. 

Sir  Henry  Taylor,  who  met  him  once  or 
twice  in  Edinburgh,  says  :  "  He  looked  like  one 
of  Robin  Hood's  company  ;  or  he  might  have 
been  Robin  himself — jovial  but  fierce — as  if  he 
would  be  the  first  at  a  feast  but  by  no  means 
the  last  at  a  fray  ;  full  of  fire  and  animal  energy, 
and  of  wit  and  sarcasm,  and  hardl\-  seeming  to 
heed  an}-body  about  him — a  man  who  has 
always  been  the  king  of  his  company.  Moral 
philosophy  was  never  taught  by  a  wilder  or 
more  fiery  Professor,  and  he  was  certainl\-  by 
far  the  most  considerable  man  1  met  with  at 
Edinburgh." 

There  is  a  beautiful  old  copy  of  the  "  Decam- 
erone "  upon  the  shelf,  given  b>-  Wilson  to 
Leicfh  Hunt,  with  a  fricndh'  word  or  two  writ- 
ten  inside,  and  a  letter  from  him  also  wluch  I 
find    laid    within   a  copy  of    the    "Vestiges   of 


100  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Creation."*     Robert  Chambers,  through  whom 

this  letter  of  Christopher  North  came  into  our 

hands,    says    that    it    was    given    him,    for    Mr. 

Fields,   by    Professor   Wilson's    daughter,   Mrs. 

Sheriff    Gordon.     "  It    is   a   very   good  letter," 

Mr.   Chambers  writes,    ''  of   that    extraordinary 

genius,"  being  one  which  he   addressed  to  the 

wife  of  Mr.  Solicitor  General  Rutherford  on  his 

daughter's  marrying  Mr.  Gordon,  Avho  was  the 

*  This  book,  the  "Vestiges,"  was  almost  as  great  a  source 
of  wonder  in  its  time  as  The  Letters  of  Junius,  or  "  Waverley  " 
itself.  It  appeared  at  a  moment  when  the  study  of  geology 
had  made  a  naiTow  faith  in  the  letters  of  the  first  chapter  of 
Genesis  impossible,  and  while  the  world  was  still  rent  with  dis- 
sensions upon  the  subject.  The  concluding  note  of  the  book 
says  :  "  Thus  ends  a  book,  composed  in  solitude,  and  almost 
without  the  cognizance  of  a  single  human  being,  for  the  sole 
purpose  (or  as  nearly  so  as  may  be)  of  improving  the  knowl- 
edge of  mankind,  and  through  that  medium  their  happiness. 
For  reasons  which  need  not  be  specified,  the  author's  name  is 
retained  in  its  original  obscurity,  and  in  all  probability  will 
never  be  generally  known.  .  .  .  The  book,  as  far  as  I  am 
aware,  is  the  first  attempt  to  connect  the  natural  sciences  into 
a  history  of  creation.  The  idea  is  a  bold  one,  and  there  are 
many  circumstances  of  time  and  place  to  render  its  boldness 
more  than  usually  conspicuous.  .  .  .  We  give,  as  is  meet, 
a  respectful  reception  to  what  is  revealed  through  the  medium 
of  nature,  at  the  same  time  that  we  fully  reserve  our  reverence 


Edinburgh  loi 


nephew  of  that  lady's  husband.  "  By  the  way," 
Mr.  Chambers  continues,  "Mrs.  Gordon  is  writ- 
ing a  memoir  of  her  father,  to  be  pubHshed  by 
Edmonston  &  Douglas,  of  Edinburgh,  and  I 
hope  you  will  deem  it  a  work  suitable  for 
reprinting  at  Boston.  I  have  a  great  faith 
in  the  memoir-writing  powers  of  women — wit- 
ness Lady  Holland's  life  of  her  father,  Sydney 
Smith,  and   the   sketch   of   Lord    North  by  his 

for  all  we  have  been  accustomed  to  hold  sacred,  not  one  tittle 
of  which  it  may  ultimately  be  found  necessary  to  alter." 

The  learning  and  common-sense  of  the  book,  its  rare  tem- 
perateness  and  wisdom,  commanded  immediate  attention.  It 
was  the  wonder  of  the  world  at  that  period,  nor  was  the  author- 
ship ever  acknowledged,  I  believe.  Therefore  it  is  sincerely 
interesting  to  find  in  Leigh  Hunt's  copy  traces  of  the  author- 
ship and  to  know  that  Mr.  Fields  settled  it  definitely  upon 
Mr.   Chambers  at  last. 

The  brothers  William  and  Robert  Chambers  are  indissolubly 
connected  with  reminiscences  of  Edinburgh.  I  remember  see- 
ing them  both  in  their  native  city  while  the  elder  brother  was 
Lord  Provost.  Robert  was  our  kind  cicerone  through  his 
beloved  haunts.  No  one  should  fancy  it  possible  to  see  Kdin- 
burgh  properly  without  a  reference  to  his  admirable  "Walks 
about  Edinburgh,"  but  to  have  the  knowledge  fresh  and  yet 
uncoined  from  the  author's  brain  was  an  excellent  preventive 
to  imperfect   sight-seeing. 


102 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


daughter    in     Brougham's   '  Statesmen    of    the 
Reign  of  George   III.'" 

In  this  letter,  which  is  now  safely  transferred 
to  the  Edinburgh  edition  of  Wilson's  Life, 
Christopher  North  writes:  "Mary's  marriage 
will  be  a  sacred  solace  to   her  afflicted   father, 


William  and    Robert  Chambers. 


and  to  know  that  she  possesses  the  affection  of 
her  husband's  dearest  friends  infuses  a  feeling 
of  peace  and  joy  into  my  desolate  and  too 
much  disturbed  heart.  Her  mother  loved 
John  Gordon — so  do  I — and  if  the  Blest  see 
those  they  have  left,  her  spirit  will  be  well- 
pleased  to  look  down   on  their  united  life." 


Edinbure^h  103 


Mr.  Fields  often  recalled  the  scene  (though  I 
think  it  must  have  been  described  to  him  after- 
ward by  one  of  the  students  who  was  present, 
perhaps  Dr.  John  Brown)  when  Wilson  came  to 
resume  his  duties  at  the  University  the  next 
session  after  the  death  of  his  wife.  He  began 
to  speak  to  his  class  as  usual,  but  feeling  the 
sympathy  of  the  young  men  he  stopped  and  his 
head  sank  upon  the  desk.  Present!}-  he  rose 
again  and  said  :  "  Gentlemen,  pardon  me,  but 
since  we  last  met  I  have  been  in  the  valley  of 
the  shadow  of  death."  The  crowd  of  students, 
the  breathless  waiting,  the  tender  confidence  to 
them,  was  something  never  to  be  forgotten 
after  hearing  it  described  as  from  an  eye- 
witness. 

Mr.  Fields  was  present  at  some  one  of  his 
lectures,  however,  and  he  always  said  in  after 
life  that  Professor  Wilson's  method  ami  man- 
ner with  his  students  was  his  ideal  of  what  tlic 
relation  of  a  teacher  to  his  scholars  shouUl  Ix'. 
The  eager  way  in  which  he  talked  to  them,  his 
whole  heart  being  in  his  work,  matle  it  imp«>ssi- 
ble  for  tluir  thoughts  to  wander.  The\'  were 
Jascinated  by  his  living  interest  in  tlieir  hehalt. 


I04  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


"Ah,  that  is  what  lecturing  to  students  can  be 
made,"   he  was  accustomed  to  say. 

I  have  found  a  few  manuscript  notes  by  Mr. 
Fields  descriptive  of  Wilson,  and  among  them 
the  following  paragraph  in  which  we  see  how 
keen  and  quick  were  his  literary  acumen  and 
his  energy  : 

"  It  was  young  John  Wilson  who  first  gave 
to  Walter  Scott  the  title  of  '  The  Great  Magi- 
cian,' by  which  name  he  was  afterwards  known 
to  all  the  world  !  It  was  young  John  Wilson 
who  pointed  out,  in  the  pages  of  the  Ediiiburgh 
Review,  the  beauties  of  '  Childe  Harold,'  long 
before  the  voice  of  universal  acclamation  was 
heard  in  the  land  ;  and  he  was  one  of  the  first 
to  recognize  the  genius  of  Charles  Dickens. 
At  the  age  of  seventeen  he  sent  off  a  letter 
of  several  sheets  to  William  Wordsworth,  then 
unrecognized  and  hooted  at  bv  the  reviewers, 
thanking  the  obscure  poet  up  among  the  hills 
of  Westmoreland  for  the  ardent  enjoyment  he, 
a  lad  at  school,  had  derived  from  a  perusal 
of  '  The   Lyrical   Ballads.'  " 

Professor  Wilson's  home  at  Elleray  was  won- 
derfulh'  beautiful. 


Edinburgh  107 


"All  Paradise 
Could  by  the  simple  opening  of  a  door 
Let  itself  in  upon   him." 

De  Ouincey  thought  it  iucomparabl)'  the  tin- 
est  terrace  view  in  England  or  Wales.  We  are 
incHned  to  think  that  De  Ouincey  ought  to 
have  known,  not  only  because  he  was  a  great 
wanderer,  but  because  it  is  recorded  of  him  that 
he  once  went  to  pass  a  day  or  two  with  Wilson 
at  Elleray  and  remained  nine  months.  "  Now 
and  then  as  I  went  down-stairs  at  seven  in  the 
morning,"  Christopher  North  said,  "  I  \\ould 
meet  De  Quincey  coming  up  to  bed  with  a 
candle  in  his  hand,  lie  was  a  gentle,  courte- 
ous creature." 

This  singular  visit  of  De  Quincey  at  Elleray, 
where  Wilson  said  he  seldom  saw  him  except 
thus  in  the  morning,  is  much  in  keeping  with 
Mr.  Fields's  own  experience  with  respect  to 
him.  In  his  first  inquiries  after  De  Ouincey, 
of  an   old  man   in    Edinburgh,  tiie   re[)ly  was  : 

"  Ye've  come  to  Edinbro'  too  late,  sir! 
They're  nearly  all  gone,  noo  !  Man)''s  the  time 
I've  seen  Sir  Walter  Scott  pass  ni}'  door  on  his 
wa\-  to  the  court,  and  I  got  to  ken  the  sound   of 


io8  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


his  stick  on  the  sidewalk  as  well  as  I  kenned 
the  voice  of  my  ain  wife  !  And  there  was  Sir 
William  Hamilton,  the  grand  looking  fellar, 
and  Mr.  Lockhart,  Sir  Walter's  son-in-law,  and 
little  Mr.  De  Ouincey,  the  great  opium-eater  as 
some  said  of  him,  and  Lord  Jeffrey,  the  pow- 
erful lawyer,  and  Professor  W^ilson,  a  match  for 
any  of  'em  !  " 

This  inclusion  of  De  Ouincey  among  those 
who  were  past  and  gone  was  one  of  the  eccen- 
tric incidents  which  surrounded  that  man  of 
genius.  When  Mr.  Fields  inquired  for  him 
more  particularly,  he  was  assured  of  his  death, 
although  "  after  a  search,"  he  writes,  "  I  found 
him  alive  and  well  in  a  cottage  ten  miles  out  of 
Edinburgh.  I  inquired  for  him  again  in  Lon- 
don in  1852,  and  authors  and  critics,  with  very 
few  exceptions,  were  uncertain  where  he  lived, 
and  one,  a  man  of  mark,  declared  to  me  that 
he  then   heard  his  name  for  the  first  time." 

It  is  already  too  well  known  for  me  to  dwell 
upon  it  here,  that  the  writings  of  Thomas  De 
Quincey  had  never  been  collected  until  they 
were  gathered  together  by  Mr.  Fields  and 
printed   in  an   edition    of  twenty-two  volumes, 


Edinburgh  109 


published  consecutively  in  Boston.  This  mii^ht 
well  account  for  his  being  unknown  in  England 
by  a  busy  writer,  for  "  who  read  an  American 
book"  in  those  days?  and  these  twenty-two 
volumes  might  be  considered  American,  inas- 
much as  De  Quincey  had  never  signed  his 
papers  in  the  English  Reviews,  which  were 
therefore  only  discoverable  by  their  st\-le. 

De  Quincey  owned  a  large  number  of  books, 
a  part  of  which  his  daughters  once  told  us 
were  at  a  cottage  in  Westmoreland,  called 
"  Town-End,"  and  others  at  Lasswade,  near 
Edinburgh ;  but  a  man  of  his  strange  habits, 
who  kept  his  letters  and  manuscripts  in  a  dis- 
used bath-tub,  was  not  likely  to  watch  closely 
over  his  books.  After  his  death  they  were 
sacrificed,  "  sold  for  nothing,"  in  a  heap  in 
Edinburgh,  before  his  friends  could  be  informed 
upon  the  subject. 

There  is  an  interesting  portrait  of  De  Quin- 
cey, modelled  in  relief,  hanging  over  the  shelf 
of  Edinburgh  books,  which  gives  something 
more  of  the  imaginative  (juality  in  his  face 
than  the  picture  by  Sir  John  Watson  ("lordnn, 
although  the   latter   is    more    generally  known. 


1  lO 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


There  is  a  very  thin  volume  also  in  the  library 
containing  a  portion  of  his  essay  on  Words- 
worth in  manuscript.  The  handwriting  is  deli- 
cate   and    refined    as   well  as  small    and    facile. 


De   Quincey.      (From   a  bas-relief  in   the   possession   OT  Mrs.    Fields.) 


This,  with  some  of  his  letters,  is  all  the  shelves 
can  show  of  De  Quincey's  literary  property  ; 
but  as  he  was  living  when  Mr.  Fields  went  to 
Edinburgh   in    1852,    I   find   a   few  unpublished 


Edinburgh  1 1 1 


reminiscences  of  a    personal  interview   at   that 
period.     "  We  had  corresponded  at  intervals  for 
many  years,"    Mr.  Fields  wrote,   "  because  the 
collection  of  his  writing's  in  America  had   been 
intrusted  to  my  care.     He  had  never  been  able 
to  afford  me    any    assistance   in    indicating  his 
essays   in    the  magazines;  as   he   had    forgotten 
their  existence  as  well  as  their  dates,  and   I  was 
obliged  to  rely  entirely  on  a  recognition  of  his 
style  and  the  topics  likely  to  be  treated  by  him." 
I  found  him  living  in  his  little  roadside  cottage 
a  few  miles  from  Edinburgh,  at    a  place  called 
Lasswade,  on   the  river  Esk.      He   had  sent  me 
directions  how  to  find  him   in   a  letter  Avhich   1 
still  preserve  as  one  of  the  curiosities  of  litera- 
ture.    When  he  came  out  to  receive  me   at  his 
garden-gate   I   thought    I    had   never  seen   any- 
thing so  small   and   pale  in  the  shape  of  a  great 
man,    nor  a  more  impressive  head    on    human 
shoulders.     The   unmistakable   alabaster   shine, 

*  My  husband  was  always  grateful  for  the  cooperation  of 
Rufus  Choate  in  discerning  De  Quincey's  style.  Mr.  Choate's 
universal  reading  and  his  appreciation  of  De  Quincey's  elo- 
quence made  him  infallible  in  discovering  any  work  of  his 
hand. 


112  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


which  I  had  noticed  in  other  opium-eaters,  was 
on  his  face,  and  the  restlessness  of  his  body 
also  proclaimed  his  well-known  habit.  Next 
after  his  personal  appearance  I  was  struck  with 
his  exquisite  courtesy.  There  was  a  finish  and 
elegance  in  his  diction  also  which  recalled 
something  of  Leigh  Hunt's  manner,  and  be- 
longed perhaps  to  a  particular  era.  I  need 
hardly  say  that  the  habits  of  my  host  at  Lass- 
wade  were  very  eccentric.  He  soon  began  to 
describe,  in  the  most  solemn  and  deliberate 
manner,  the  nondescript  animal  which  he  said 
was  forever  gnawing  in  the  interior  of  his 
body,  forever  moving,  and  forever  busy  at  his 
ghastly  work.  It  Avas  profoundly  sad  to  hear 
this  wonderful  genius,  this  master  of  all  knowl- 
edge, talking  at  intervals  such  unreason,  and 
with  earnestness  and  power.  .  .  .  During 
a  walk  of  fourteen  miles  which  we  took  to- 
gether, his  mind  would  sometimes  dwell  on 
the  past,  and  I  remember  the  delightful  his- 
tory he  gave  me  of  those  days  among  the  hills 
of  Westmoreland  when  his  daih'  companions 
were  Professor  Wilson,  Coleridge,  and  Words- 
worth.     He  had  much   to    say  also  of  the    har- 


^^-^U/k^U4/A.^ 


J'W^ 


fluf    2<Uv^   A/Tyiifuc^—  /t^i^rj/nw^  Jfy^7>Uui:Kf  14^1,^  .    .^U— 
^   ^    ^1^^    ^^^i^.-^    l^^^i^f^^ 


Reduced  Fac-simile  of  a  Page  from  a  Note  by  De  Quintuy  to  Mr.   Fields. 


114  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


monies  of  language,  the  perfection  of  finish  in 
English  prose  writers  who  had  passed  into 
fame,  and  he  quoted  to  me  Goethe's  saying, 
that  the  difficult}^  in  composition  lies  not  in 
learning  but  in  ////learning.  Then  he  spoke  of 
his  own  baffled  efforts,  his  defeated  hopes  in 
life,  of  his  unfinished  work  on  the  Human  In- 
tellect, which  he  had  longed  to  leave  behind 
him  completed  as  his  crowning  effort.  Many 
things,  too,  he  said  to  me  in  confidence  which 
cannot  be  revealed.  If  they  were  true  they 
ought  never  to  be  recorded,  and  if  they  were 
only  the  dreams  of  opium  they  should  be  al- 
lowed to  fade  like  the  unsubstantial  visions  of 
a  deluded  brain.  He  spoke  of  Charles  Lamb 
and  Southey  with  love  and  tenderness,  and 
when  he  mentioned  John  Wilson  his  eyes 
filled  and  his  voice  trembled. 

"  He  asked  many  questions  about  America, 
and  he  understood  the  geography  of  our  coun- 
try better  than  any  untravelled  American  I  had 
ever  met.  Webster's  argument  in  the  Salem- 
White   murder  case  he  thoucrht  contained   the 


'fc>' 


grandest    utterances    ever   made   in   a  court   of 


fc> 


justice. 


Edinburgh  115 


"As  we  walked  aloiiL;-.  his  manner  became  at 
times  singularl}'  nervous  and  startlini;'.  Not 
infrequentl}-  he  spoke  like  a  man  who  had  seen 
ghosts,  and  there  \\as  a  kind  of  solemn  awe 
and  wonder  in  his  tone.  Much  of  the  time 
he  walked  bareheaded,  as  if  his  brain  were  hot 
and  troublesome,  and  I  noticed  there  was  on 
his  brow  that  signature  of  sorrow  not  uncom- 
mon to  the  sons  of   genius. 

"He  seemed  to  me  to  have  accomplished 
nothing  with  his  pen,  great  as  his  achieve- 
ments have  been,  compared  to  the  eloquence 
and  greatness  of   his  spoken  words. 

"  When  the  time  came  for  me  to  say  '  good- 
night,' and  return  to  Edinburgh,  De  Ouincey, 
who  had  been  talking  all  the  evening  in  a  strain 
of  unequalled  interest,  began  the  prelude  to  a 
new  theme.  y\lthough  the  carriage  had  long 
been  waiting  at  the  door,  I  was  bound  to  hear 
and  still  lingered  listening.  At  last,  when  the 
moment  of  dei)arture  arrived,  De  Ouincey  rose 
and  said,  in  his  solemn  manner,  '  I  feel  that  at 
my  period  of  life,  and  \-our  home  being  three 
thousand  miles  away,  the  chances  are  against 
our   ever   meeting    again.     .Send    \-our   carriage 


ii6  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


back  to  Edinburgh,  and  let  us  have  a  midnight 
walk  to  the  city."  Not  wishing  to  have  him  go 
so  far  as  ten  miles  on  foot,  I  proposed  that  he 
should  then  retire  to  bed  and  let  me  say  '  fare- 
well.' This  he  declined  peremptorily,  and  I 
then  agreed  that  he  should  walk  a  few  miles  on 
with  me,  the  carriage  following  our  footsteps. 
It  was  a  black,  misty  Scottish  night,  and  as  we 
trudged  along  1  could  hear  the  Esk  River  roar- 
ine:  at  our  side.  De  Ouincev  entered  upon  a 
fresh  theme  the  moment  we  got  out  into  the 
dark  open  country.  The  sight  of  cottages  and 
other  dwellings  closed  and  cheerless  in  the  mid- 
night gloom  led  him  to  speak  of  the  household 
wrecks  he  had  witnessed.  Leading  me  up  to 
the  front  of  a  large  dilapidated  mansion,  as 
the  wind  A\histled  in  at  the  broken  windows, 
he  described  the  hours  of  happiness  he  had  in 
former  years  been  accustomed  to  pass  ^\•ith 
those  who  had  once  dwelt  in  luxury  within. 
Insanity,  Fraud,  Suicide,  had  entered  at  various 
epochs  within  these  once  radiant  walls,  '  and 
now,'  said  De  Ouincey,  with  a  shuddering  sigh, 
'behold  the  conquest  of  sorrow!' 

"  We  were   many  miles  away  from   his   own 


Edinburgh  117 


door  and  it  was  almost  morning,  when  I  took 
his  hand  for  the  last  time,  and  under  the 
shadow  of  the  Scottish  hills  bade  him  farewell, 
as  he  i^lided  off  into  the  darkness  toward  Lass- 
wade.  I  watched  his  slight  figure,  vanishing, 
reappearing,  vanishing,  until  it  was  lost  in  the 
mist — faded   forever  from   nn'  vision. 

"  In  after  years  when  I  stood  by  his  grave 
in  the  Edinburgh  church}-ard  and  thought  of 
his  strange,  struggling  life,  I  recalled  his  own 
words  about  a  battlefield  that  nature  had  long 
since  healed  and  reconciled  to  herself  under 
the  tender  oblivion  of   flowers." 

There  is  one  old  brown  book  u])on  tlie 
Edinburgh  shelf  connected  with  Robert  Iknns. 
Who  can  think  of  Edinburgh  without  a  \'ision 
of  his  beautiful  unhappy  face  rising  up  before 
us,  "a  miserable  and  mighty  poet  of  the  human 
heart"?  It  is  a  copy  of  the  first  lulinbuigh 
edition  of  his  poems,  the  same  for  \\hicli  tlie 
members  of  the  Caledonian  Hunt  subscribed, 
taking  one  hundred  copies,  and  which  I'urns 
said  it  gave  him  "  so  much  real  happiness  to 
see  in  ])rint."  This  copy  was  said  to  have 
been  a  <n'ft    from  llurns  to  some  \\<iman,  but    I 


ii8  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


find  no  proof  of  this.  It  is  interesting  enough, 
however,  with  its  list  of  grand  names,  and  when 
we  recall  all  the  circumstances  of  its  publica- 
tion. A  small  edition  of  his  poems  had  been 
printed  the  year  previous  at  Kilmarnock,  and 
the  rapidity  with  which  it  sold  was  a  good 
promise  for  his  poetic  future.  There  was  a 
"  reprint  and  fac-simile  "  of  this  edition  brought 
out  in  1867,  of  which,  also,  only  six  hundred 
copies  were  made,  and  one  of  these  reprints 
fortunately  is  now  here  before  me.  There  is 
here  a  manuscript  letter,  too,  from  Burns,  ad- 
dressed to  Captain  Hamilton,  of  Dumfries. 
It  is  a  sorrowful  letter  enough,  full  of  money 
troubles,  and  confirms  wdiat  we  already  know 
of  his  misfortunes. 

Burns  in  Edinburgh,  with  his  new  leather- 
covered  book,  now  looking  so  old  and  accord- 
ing to  modern  ideas  so  unattractive,  was  at  the 
summit  of  his  life's  happiness.  Mr.  Fields 
often  told  how  Burns  was  seen  at  that  time  by 
Mrs.  Basil  Montague,  who  later,  in  her  old  age, 
loved  to  describe  him.  She  was  herself  just 
entering  society  as  a  young  girl,  she  used  to 
say,  when    Burns   was    enjoying    the  first-fruits 


Edinburgh 


iiQ 


of  his  fame.     "  I  have  seen  many  a  handsome 
man  in  my  time,"  she  would  say ;   "  but  none 


4  ".i'llilj 


Robert    Burns,      ,From  a   daguerreotype   in  the   possession  of  Mrs.   F.elds- 
from  a  miniature.) 

of  them  equalled  youn<4  Robbie  Burns.  I 
never  saw  such  a  pair  of  eyes  as  flashed  from 
under  his  n()l>lc   forehead." 


120  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Burns  had  by  no  means  grown  up  ignorant 
of  books.  In  his  father's  cottage  there  were 
many  volumes  famous  in  those  days,  which 
were  well  read  by  the  young  son,  but  of 
poetry,  except  Fergusson's  and  Allan  Ramsay's, 
there  was  nothing,  save  a  collection  of  ballads 
and  songs  owned  by  a  strange  old  woman  who 
lived  with  them.  He  did  not  forget  his  love 
for  the  two  poets  who  had  helped  to  nurse  his 
young  genius,  and  the  first  places  he  is  known 
to  have  visited  in  Edinburgh  were  the  lowly 
grave  of  Fergusson  and  the  house  of  Allan 
Ramsay. 

Among  Mr.  Fields's  papers  I  find  a  page 
where  he  speaks  of  meeting  one  of  the  sons  of 
Burns  in  London  in  1859.  "I  asked  him  what 
made  on  him  (as  a  boy)  the  deepest  impression 
of  his  father's  personality  ?  He  said,  '  The  sym- 
pathetic tone  of  his  voice  whenever  he  spoke  to 
any  poor  person,  any  one  poorer  and  more  suf- 
fering than  himself.'  "  It  was  from  the  hand  of 
this  son  that  we  received  the  daguerreotype  of 
Burns  taken  from  a  portrait  still,  I  believe,  in 
possession   of  the  family. 

Lockhart's  description  of  Burns  at  this  period 


Edinburgh 


121 


,l,l"'' 
ll"<l||||||< 


'',:,;,!',"  M  ^ 


Ml    ' 


Portrait  of  Ramsay.      (From  an   edition  of  his  poems  published   in    1751.) 


in    KdinburL^ii,   as    ^ivtMi   to   liim    1)\-   Sir  Waller 
Scott,    Mr.    I-"icl(ls   used   to   say  was    the   one   he 


122  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


liked  above  all  others.  Scott  was  a  lad  of  fif- 
teen when  Burns  came  up  to  receive  the  hom- 
age of  his  native  country  at  the  hands  of  all  the 
distinguished  men  and  women  gathered  in  the 
classic  city  to  welcome  him.  Young  Walter 
was  longing  to  see  Burns,  but  as  he  had  at  that 
time  small  acquaintance  with  literary  people  it 
seemed  as  if  he  would  never  have  the  coveted 
opportunity.  "  I  would  have  given  the  world 
to  know  him,"  said  Scott  to  Lockhart,  and  at 
last  fortune  favored  the  young  lad.  One  day 
Professor  Fergusson  invited  some  persons  to 
meet  Burns  at  his  house,  and  among  them  came 
the  boy  who  was  afterward  to  equal  even  Burns 
in  the  affectionate  consideration  of  Scotland. 
"  We  youngsters,"  says  Scott,  '*  sat  silent  and 
looked  and  listened."  Some  one  was  showing 
Burns  an  engraving  hanging  up  in  the  room. 
It  was  a  print  representing  a  soldier  lying  dead 
in  the  snow,  his  dog  sitting  in  misery  on  one 
side,  and  on  the  other  the  dead  soldier's  widow 
with  a  child  in  her  arms.  Underneath  the  en- 
graving these  lines  were  printed  : 

"  Cold  on  Canadian  hills  or  Minden's  plain, 
Perhaps  that  narent  wept  her  soldier  slain, 


Edinburgh  121 


Bent  o'er  her  babe,  lier  eye  dissolved  in  dew  ; 
The  big  drops  mingling  with  the  milk  he  drew 
Gave  the  sad   presage  of  his  future  years, 
The  child  of  misery  baptized   in   tears." 

Btirns  looked  at  the  picture,  read  the  Hues, 
and  burst  into  tears.  He  then  asked  who  had 
written  them.  Nobody  in  the  group  except 
young  Scott  remembered  the  author's  name, 
and  he  modestly  whispered  to  a  gentleman 
standing  near  that  the  lines  occur  in  a  half-for- 
gotten poem  by  Langhorne.  The  gentleman 
mentioned  the  fact  to  Burns  and  revealed  his 
informant's  name.  Burns  bent  his  brimming 
eyes  on  the  boy  and  rewarded  him  with  a  look 
and  a  word  of  thanks  which  Walter  Scott  re- 
membered during  his  whole  life. 

Burns's  love  for  Allan  Ramsav  leads  us  to 
take  tenderly  down  from  the  shelf  the  two 
small  volumes  of  his  poems. 

Ramsay  died  in  1757,  and  this  edition  was 
printed  in  London  during  his  life,  in  1751. 
They  are  (juaint  leather-covered  books,  with  an 
uni)ublished  autograph  poem  b\'  Ramsa\'  on 
the  first  page.  lie  was  ver_\'  ]K)])ular  in  his  da\', 
and  stopped  a  gaj)  before  the  time  of  Scott  and 


124 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Mis.   Lockhait,    Scott  s   daugliter. 


Burns.  He  turned  publisher,  too,  and  became 
a  rich  man  in  spite  of  building  a  theatre  and 
brineinir  righteous  Scotland  down  about  his 
head.     But   he  established   the  first  circulating 


/5t-  /9vAy  ^s-i^^i^  ik'^^il ^^^iTh  . 

^^t/^  CcOxyt  ^ffur  ^u,^Q}>   cvO^V*^^^*;:-^ 

kaA^^^fi^ji^  a    ^^hM--  ^'^,  ^^^  //^^ 

(Z^^^ty  ^n^,^^^  Jk.4!n^a^cUC  iKor-at:^^^ 

Fac-simile  of  an  Autograph   Poem   by  Allan   Ramsay,    wnttc-n   on   the   first 
page  of  an  edition  of  his  poems. 


126  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


library  ever  seen  in  Scotland,  and  many  sins 
should  have  been  forgiven  him  for  that.  His 
verses,  which  I  will  transcribe,  show  him  to 
have  been  a  man  of  wit  and  manners  in  his  day. 

Jan.  29-31. 
To   Mr.   James   Home,  Writer  to  the  Signet. 
Sir, 

These  two  volumes  come  to   prove 
Your  poet's  gratitude  and  love. 
To  you,   whose   taste  and   friendly  spirit 
Encourage  the  least   liints  of  merit — 
Impartially  without   regard 
Whether  in  Shepherd,   Lord,   or  Laird  ; 
For  which  and   many  an   other  favour,     - 
That  bind   me  to  my  best  behavi<nir, 
I  from  this  honest  heart   of  mine 
Beg  you   t'accept  this  small  propine  : 
Thouo-h  scant  the  value,  vet  believe 
It  is  the  best  that  I  can  give. 
And  the  most   proper,  you'll  allow, 
For  me  to   give  to  such  as  you. 

Then   with  a  friendly  smile  admit 
Me   'mongst  your  laughing  friends  to  sit: 
Root  yont  your  Milton  and  your  Pope 
That  chant  sublime  from  the  hill-top: 


Edinburgh  127 


Make  me  a  birlh-a'///;/,  that   I   may 
Crane  in   with   liutler,  Malt,  and  Gay  ; 
That  wlien  the  spleen,  or  aught  that's  sour, 
Attacl-:s  you  in  a  drum!)ly  hour- 
With   these,  did   Allan   come  before  ye, 
And   to  your  gayety   restore  ye — 
If  I   in   this  can   rciomnu-nd 
My   muse  to  you,  I've  gained   my  end  ; 
And   if  you   own   that   I   can  stnvjf 
A  song  or  Tale,  nor  dull  nor  dowf, 
At  some  with  no  small   pride   I'll  sneer. 
Whose  noddles  are  not  (|uite  so  clear, 
And  never  tent  their  spitetull  grumble 
While  you  stand  by  your 

servant  humble, 

All  AX  Ra.msav. 
From   my  closet  in  Edr. 
August  lod),    1733. 

There  is  a  spirited  portrait  by  Sniibcrt  in  the 
first  voliinic,  which  gives  me  a  desire  to  say 
with  Quince,  in  "  Midsummer  Niglit's  Dream," 

"  Let  us  hear  sweet  Bottom." 

We  find  in  it  stieh  an  as[)ect  of  ready  s[)eeeh. 
Leigh  Hunt's  name  is  on  the  first  page,  ant!  liis 
marks    are    to    i)c   found    tin-oiighout    wherever 


128  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


original  beauty  is  to  be  recognized.     One  line 
I   see, 

"To  waft  their  young  white  souls  through  fields  of  air," 

that  is  crystallized  and  will  endure. 

The  "Gentle  Shepherd,"  too,  may  well  have 
won  laurels  in  his  day,  and  may  still  command 
a  loving  reader.  Burns  was  once  heard  inquir- 
ing for  the  shop  of  the  author  of  the  "  Gentle 
Shepherd." 

The  picture  of  Walter  Scott  in  his  interview 
with  Burns  leads  us  to  turn  to  the  goodly  row 
of  books  which  are  precious  because  of  their 
association  with  him. 

The  copy  of  the  first  edition  of  the  "  Lay  of 
the  Last  Minstrel "  is  a  fine  quarto  bound  in 
morocco  and  printed  as  beautifully  as  Scott's 
taste  and  the  devoted  care  of  his  printer  and 
publisher  could  devise.  We  can  imagine  the 
pleasure  of  the  young  American  book-lover  on 
his  first  visit  to  Edinburgh  in  finding  this  vol- 
ume and  making  it  his  own. 

It  was  fifteen  years  only  after  Scott's  death 
that  Mr.  Fields  first  saw  "  the  gray  metropolis 
of  the  North  "  and  "  the  castle  proudly  looming 


Scott.     (From  the  portrait  by  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence,   painted  (or  George  IV.  in   1820.) 


Edinbumh  i  "i 


in  the  earlv  sunlifjht,"  and  was  received  b\-  his 
"  landlady  in  her  nightcap  at  the  top  of  the 
stairs."  How  speedily  he  was  away  again  to 
Black's,  the  publisher,  and  afterward  to  Black- 
wood's, "  seeing  the  portrait  of  John  Wilson," 
and  much  else,  we  cannot  doubt,  it  being  still 
very  early  in  the  morning  and  these  gentlemen 
hardly  at  their  of^ces. 

As  soon  as  the  coach  could  start  he  was  away 
to  Abbotsford.  To  his  joy  he  found  a  Scottish 
lady  on  the  top  of  the  coach  beside  him  who 
knew  every  inch  of  the  ground,  and  had  seen 
Scott  when  she  was  a  child.  She  knew  Lock- 
hart,  also,  and  pointed  out  all  the  hills  and 
castles  as  she  talked,  and  he  was  sorry  indeed 
when  the  coach  set  her  down  at  her  journey's 
end.  Soon,  with  hurrying  feet,  he  found  him- 
self in  Scott's  library,  "  walled  about  with 
books,"  which  he  examined  with  loving  scru- 
tiny. He  was  deeply  impressed  with  the  care 
which  had  been  given  them,  and  recalled  Lock- 
hart's  saying  how  full  Scott's  dcu  in  Castle 
Street  was  of  quartos  and  folios  "all  in  that 
complete  state  of  repair  which  at  a  glance 
reveals   a   tincre   "f   bibliomania.     A  dozen   \-ol- 


132  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


umes  or  so,  needful  for  immediate  purposes  of 
reference,  were  placed  close  by  him  on  a  small 
movable  frame  something  like  a  dumb-waiter. 
All  the  rest  were  in  their  proper  niches,  and 
wherever  a  volume  had  been  lent,  its  room  was 
occupied  by  a  wooden  block  of  the  same  size, 
having  a  card  with  the  name  of  the  borrower 
and  date  of  the  loan  tacked  on  its  front.  The 
old  bindings  had  obviously  been  re-touched  and 
re-gilt  in  the  most  approved  manner." 

We  can  imagine  the  incipient  publisher  peer- 
ing about  among  them  and  revelling  in  the 
knowledge  that  this  friend  of  youth  every- 
where, this  romance  lover  and  writer,  this  hero 
of  his  heart,  should  be  a  man  to  care  so  ten- 
derly about  his  books. 

I  cannot  tell  at  what  "  corner  shop  "  he  found 
this  treasure  on  his  return  to  Edinburgh,  but 
he  not  onlv  boujjht  it,  he  also  enriched  it  with 
whatever  he  could  find  to  add  to  its  value. 
He  has  laid  in  it  an  engraved  copy  of  Chan- 
trey's  bust  of  Scott,  and  one  of  the  painting  by 
Sir  Thomas  Lawrence,  and  a  note,  also,  written 
at  the  moment  Scott  was  sitting  for  this  por- 
trait.    Beside  these  there  is  a  delightful  picture 


^Xi^^jUC.     £.Uh     'UlJ^^     ^<^^^    ""   f^   ^^^ 


^ 


dj^u-  ?7^ 


Fac-simile  of  a  Note  from  Scott. 


'34 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


taken  when  Scott  was  a  child  of  six  years,  and 
romantic  pictures  of  his  two  daughters,  by- 
Nicholson  ;  also  engravings  of  Abbotsford  and 
Dryburgh.  But  the  charm  of  the  volume  after 
all  lies  in  the  fact  that  Scott  himself  assisted  at 


From  a  miniature  of  Walter   Scott,    made  at  Bath,    in   his  fifth   or  sixth  year. 

this  sumptuous  debut  of  his  poem  and  rejoiced 
in  its  fitting  dress;  that  he  handled  this  very 
copy  perchance,  and  pronounced  upon  the 
"  tooling  "  of  the  covers,  the  thickness  of  the 
paper,  and  the  kind  of  type.  It  brings  us 
nearer  to  him,  in   short,  than  anything. 


Wi 


Edinburgh  1^5 

One  of  the  curious  facts  relating  to  Scott's 
books  is  the  rapidity  of  their  production,  and 
^Ir.  Fields  has  made  a  note  to  the  effect  that 
"  '  The  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel '  was  dashed 
off  at  the  rate  of  a  canto  a  week  !  "  It  seems 
that  "  Waverley,"  too,  was  written  at  the  same 
white  heat  "  in  thirty  summer  eveninirs,"  and 
Scott  somewhere  says,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend  : 
"  When  I  once  set  pen  to  paper  it  walks  off 
fast  enough.  I  am  sometimes  tempted  to  leave 
it  alone  and  see  whether  the  pen  will  not  write 
as  well  without  the  assistance  of  my  head  as 
with   it." 

The  success  of  the  "  Lay  "  caused  Constable 
&  Co.  to  make  Sir  Walter  an  offer  for  "  ]\Lir- 
mion,"  which  he  had  already  begun.  The  sum 
they  mentioned  was  so  large  as  to  startle  the 
literary  world — it  was  one  thousand  pounds. 
Lockhart  says  of  this  work:  "  '  Marmion  '  was 
first  printed  in  a  splendid  quarto,  price  one 
guinea  and  a  half.  The  two  thousand  copies 
of  this  editif)n  \\ere  all  disposed  of  in  less 
than  a  month." 

Where  the  nineteen  hundred  and  ninet\'-nine 
other  copies   ma\'   be    1    know   not,  but    here    is 


136 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


one  of  that   edition  before  me  as  I  write.     This 
cop\'    is    also    enriched    by    a    portrait    of    the 


Walttr   S^utt,    V.  litei    t^   ti.u    Signet,    father   of   Sir   Walter, 

mother  of  Scott,  Anne  Rutherford,  and  a  pict- 
ure of  Abbotsford  in    1812. 

At  various  times  the  first  editions  of  the 
"  Lady  of  the  Lake  "  and  "  Rokeby  "  were 
added     to    our  collection,  and    a  copy  in    two 


Edinburgh 


U7 


volumes  (also  first  edition)  of  Scott's  "  Border 
Antiquities."     Scott    evidently  lost   nothin-   of 


Anne   Ruthuiford,    St-utt'o  mulher. 


his  pleasure  in  beautiful  books  as  he  L^rew 
older,  f(M-  the  last  is  one  both  author  and  pub- 
lisher nii-ht  be  pn.ud  of.  The  tlx-leaves  are 
rich    Willi    in^erled    portraits   and   aulo-raphs. 


138 


A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


There  was  something  in  the  wholesome 
humanity  of  Walter  Scott  which  caused  men 
and  will   long  cause   them    to  regard  anything 


.111         M,    .    .  ,.    .  .         ,         ,1  yp 


ll.   I 


l[      '  I  III  ;'Vf,'  '- «  , 
ii         «l'.'.i'ifiiiif    '/  M  ' 


Lady  Scott. 

which  belonged  to  him,  and  even  the  spots  he 
haunted,  as  sacred  in  their  eyes.  Since  his  day 
Edinburgh  has  become  a  shrine  for  pilgrims  in 


Edinburgh  1^9 


a  new  sense.  Men  admired  the  beauty  of  its 
castle-crowned  steep  before  he  livx-d,  and  vis- 
ited Holyrood  and  caught  gh'mpses  liere  and 
there  of  its  historic  interest,  but  from  the  mo- 
ment he  came  upon  the  scene  the  whole  his- 
toric material  of  the  place  was  organized  and 
vitalized  anew.  Dinner-table  wits  of  his  day 
said  that  Scott's  talk  was  commonplace,  but 
Lockhart  once  replied  :  "  Yes,  it  is  common- 
place as  the  sunshine  is  which  gilds  the  most 
indifferent  objects  and  adds  brilliancy  to  the 
brightest." 

Adam  Black  once  told  Mr.  Fields  that  when 
Scott  came  stumping  along  the  road  with  his 
cane  and  his  dog  and  raised  his  cheery  voice  it 
seemed  as  if  his  merr\-  laugh  cleared  the  whole 
air  ;  and  from  an  old  man  in  Glasgow  he  gained 
still  another  peep  at  Scott's  delightful  nature 
and  of  his  relations  with  men.  It  seems  that 
this  person  had  carried  a  law-case  to  him  for 
adjustment.  "How  did  lie  manage  it?"  Mr. 
Fields  asked.  "Oh,  beautifully,"  said  the  old 
client.  "  He  told  me  a  ])onny  story  aboot  a 
coo  and  a  calf  in  Dundee,  and  then  he  sent  me 
over  the  way  to  a  brither    lawyer,  who,  he  told 


I40  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


me,  had  a  langer  head  for  sich  affairs  than  him- 
sel'.  But  it  was  a  braw  story  that  he  told  me 
aboot  the  cattle  o'  Dundee,  and  it  makes  me 
laugh   to    this    day   when    I    think   on't." 

But  of  all  the  delightful  memories  of  Scott's 
power  of  love  and  sympathy  none  can  outrun 
that  beautiful  picture  of  him  given  by  Dr. 
Brown,  as  he  bends  over  his  belated  Pet  Mar- 
jorie  where  she  sits  in  her  little  white  dress  in 
the  dinsjv  sedan  chair  in  his  "  lobby,"  while  he 
calls  his  friends  from  the  supper-table  to  wel- 
come her.  "  Sit  ye  there,  my  dautie,  till  they 
a'  see  you."  Surely  it  is  this  gift  above  all  the 
rest  Avhich  makes  us  value  the  least  trifle  with 
which  he  had  to  do,  the  gift  of  which  Matthew 
Arnold  has  said  : 

"  For   will   and    energy,  though  rare, 
Are  yet,   far,  far  less   rare    than   love." 


FROM     MILTON     TO 
THACKERAY 


I 


Bust  of   Milton,    about   1654. 

(Reproduced  from  a  photograph  of  the  only  mould  of  the  original  cast  from  life, 
preserved  In  Trinity  College  Library,  Cambridge,  England,  which  was  taken 
by   kind    permission   of  the   Master  and   Fellows  of  Trinity.) 


FROM    MILTON    TO 
THACKERAY 

In  John  Milton's  "Speech  to  the  Parliament 
of  England  "  upon  the  "  Liberty  of  Unlicensed 
Printing,"  he  sa\-s  :  "Books  are  not  absolutely 
dead  things,  but  do  contain  a  potencie  of  life  in 
them  to  be  as  active  as  that  soule  was  whose 
progeny  they  are  ;  nay,  they  do  preserve  as  in  a 
violl  the  purest  efficacie  and  extraction  of  that 
li\ing  intellect  that  bred  them.  .  .  .  Who 
kills  a  man  kills  a  reasonable  creature,  God's 
image;  but  hee  who  destroys  a  good  book,  kills 
reason  it  selfe :  .  .  .  slays  an  immortalit}- 
rather  than  a  life." 

The  "Areopagetica,"  *  with  its  inequalities  of 

*  DeQuincey  says  of  tlie  "  Areopagetica  ":  "  It  is  tlic  finest 
specimen  extant  of  generous  scorn.  And  very  remarknblc  it  is 
that  Milton,  who  broke  the  jijroiind  on  this  great  tlienie,  has 
exhausted  tlie  arguments  vvhicli  hear  upon  it.  lie  opened  tlie 
subject  ;  he  closed  it.  And  were  there  no  otiur  monument  of 
his  i^atriotism  and  genius,  for  this  alone  he  would  ile-erve  to 
be  held  in  perpetual  veneration."' 


144  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


diction  and  its  immortalities  of  thought  and 
expression,  has  been  made  to  live  again  for 
modern  readers  by  means  of  the  introduction 
written  for  it  by  Lowell  a  few  years  ago,  at  the 
instance  of  the  Grolier  Club  of  New  York.  It 
stands  upon  the  shelf,  a  very  pretty  and  a  very 
precious  small  volume  with  Lowell's  inscription 
and  alterations  of  his  own  text.  As  an  example 
of  Lowell's  English  style,  and  of  the  manner 
in  which  he  has,  within  the  small  compass  of  an 
introduction,  served  to  keep  the  "  well  of  Eng- 
lish undefiled,"  it  is  of  inestimable  and  incom- 
parable value  to  the  modern  world  of  letters. 
His  criticism  of  Milton's  character,  as  expressed 
in  his  stvle,  is  a  distinct  contribution  to  the  his- 
tory  of  the  man  ;  he  has  strengthened  the  arch  of 
Milton's  fame,  and  brought  us  closer  to  his  per- 
sonality. We  feel  a  fresh  kinship  to  the  writer 
who,  in  times  not  wholly  unlike  our  own,  felt 
the  public  problems  to  be  a  weight  of  personal 
responsibility. 

"As  a  master  of  harmony  and  of  easily  main- 
tained elevation  in  English  blank  verse,"  writes 
Lowell,  "  Milton  has  no  rival.  He  was  "  {versed. 
he   first  wrote)  "  skilled    in   main^  tongues  and 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray 


14s 


many  literatures  ;  he  had  weighed  the  value  of 
words,  whether  for  sound  or  sense,  or  where  the 
two  may  be  of  mutual  help.  He,  surely,  if  any, 
was  what  he  calls  '  a  mint-master  of  language.' 
He  must  have  known,  if  any  ever  knew,  that 
even   in   the  scrmo  pedcstris  there  are  yet  great 


Horton,    Milton's   Early   Home. 

differences  in  gait,  that  prose  is  governed  by 
laws  of  modulation  as  exact,  if  not  so  exact- 
ing, as  those  of  verse,  and  that  it  may  conjure 
with  wcjrds  as  prevailingly.  The  music  is 
secreted  in  it,  yet  often  mure  jjutent  in  sugges- 
tion than  that  of  any  verse  which  is  not  of 
utmost  mastery.  We  hearken  after  it  as  to  a 
10 


146  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


choir  in  the  side  chapel  of  some  cathedral  heard 
faintly  and  fitfully  across  the  long  desert  of  the 
nave,  now  pursuing  and  overtaking  the  cadences, 
only  to  have  them  grow  doubtful  again  and 
elude  the  car  before  it  has  ceased  to  throb  with 
them.  .  .  .  Milton  is  not  so  truly  a  writer 
of  great  prose  as  a  great  man  writing  in  prose, 
and  it  is  really  Milton  we  seek  there  more  than 
anything  else."  Therefore,  because  we  seek 
Milton,  we  value  the  early  editions  of  his  works 
which  are  upon  the  shelf  of  old  books.  Dryden 
is  said  to  have  remarked,  when  the  first  edition 
of  "  Paradise  Lost  "  met  his  eye :  "  The  man 
cuts  us  all  out,  and  the  ancients,  too."  It  is  not 
unlikely  that  the  quaint  remark  of  Mr.  S.  Sim- 
mons, the  printer,  to  his  "  Courteous  Reader," 
upon  the  first  page  of  this  first  edition,  had 
in  view  Dryden  and  other  celebrated  writers 
and  critics  of  that  century.  It  may  well  have 
"  stumbled  "  Dryden,  who  never  freed  himself 
from  the  shackles  of  rhyme,  to  read  the  stately 
blank  verse  of  Milton  for  the  first  time.  Milton 
lived  largely  "in  a  world  of  disesteem,"  and  had 
grown  somewhat  hardy  perhaps  in  the  cold 
winds  which  brought    him   no   fruit  of  approval 


FO  E  M  s,&c: 

^^(y//iUf  UPON  </'^''^>^ 

Several  Qccafions. 


Mv.7  0  H  N    M  IL  T  0  N: 

— -^ 

BothENG  LISH  and  L  ATlN,Scc. 
Compoled  at  (evcral  times. 


vfichafmallTraaatcof 

E  DUG  A  T  I O  N 

JoMu  HARTLIB. 


0  mf,  ni\t\jL  i^\ 


Therms  (h'.<y:  T/i^maj  Oi^y_ 

Printed  for  Tho.Dr'mg  at  the  Blew  Aftchor 

next  Mitre  Court  over  againfi:  Fetter 

Ldtte  in  Fket-jireh,    1673. 


■«•-*'    II   ^-<mm^^ 


I       ^  :  (Vtfy: 


148  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


from  the  harvests  of  the  world.  He  wrote  his 
prose  with  a  stinging  pen,  and  when  music  from 
the  upper  air  came  to  him  for  transmission  in 
verse  he  took  no  counsel  from  the  nether  sphere 
as  to  form  or  doctrine.  His  first  appearance  in 
letters  was  in  the  second  folio  of  Shakespeare, 
where  three  anonymous  tributes  to  Shake- 
speare's genius  prefaced  the  plays.  Milton  and 
Ben  Jonson  wrote  two  of  them.  A  small  vol- 
ume came  somewhat  later,  in  1645,  containing 
his  early  poems,  the  second  edition  of  which, 
printed  in  1673,  lies  before  me.  It  belonged 
to  Thomas  Gra}'  when  a  schoolboy,  his  name 
being  written  OXLV  nine  times  by  himself  upon 
the  title-page. 

There  have  been  innumerable  editions  of  the 
"  Paradise  Lost  "  printed  in  every  variety  of  lux- 
ury. In  opening  one  large  folio  of  some  magnifi- 
cence in  book-making,  printed  in  Glasgow  in 
the  year  1770,  I  find  an  apology  for  a  new  edi- 
tion. Apparently  the  university  and  the  uni- 
versity press  had  set  their  hearts  upon  doing 
a  fine  piece  of  work,  and  under  the  editorship 
of  Dr.  Newton  they  printed,  bound,  and  sold, 
chiefly  among    themselves,   the    larger    part    of 


•»« 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  149 

the  edition.  To  the  names  of  the  Glasgow 
men  arc  added  those  of  a  number  of  the  most 
considerable  personages  of  Scotland  before  the 
era  of  Sir  Walter  Scott.  The  list  represents 
fairl\-  well  the  great  world  of  the  North  at  that 
period,  and  the  titles  and  well-known  names 
add  a  conspicuous  and  interesting  feature  to 
this  edition. 

There  is  still  another  old  book  marked  "  ver>' 
rare,"  a  relic  of  the  days  of  Milton  ;  it  is  a  copy 
of  his  "  History  of  Britain   to  the  Norman  Con- 
quest."      The    volume     is     labelled    "  f^rst    edi- 
tion;" yet  loath  as  a  possessor  of  jewels  must 
be   to   find   that  a  diamond  has  been   replaced 
b}-   a   stone   of  less  pure   water,  I    fnid    myself 
unable  to  believe  that  this  old   book   is  a   first 
edition   at  all!     The  date  of  its  publication   is 
1677.      Milton    died    in     1674,   and    this    History 
of  Britain  was  surely  i)ul)lished   in   his  lifetime. 
In    the   "Biography"   we   are    told    that    it    ap- 
peared first  in   1670,  seven  \-ears  before  the  date 
of   the    book  in    my   hand  ;    also   that    the    first 
edition  contained  a  portrait  by    I'^u'thorne.      It 
is   impossible   now  to  sa_\-  b}-  whom  the   porliail 
was     made    in     this,    evidently,   second    edition. 


150  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


The  painter's  name  is  not  upon  the  engraving, 
which  is  pasted  in  upon  a  fly-leaf.  Doubtless 
some  enthusiastic  owner  took  it  for  granted 
that  this  was  a  "  first  edition,"  and  therefore 
affixed  a  printed  label  with  the  announcement 
on  the  outside  of  the  book  below  the  title. 

A  very  interesting  edition  of  Milton's  Poeti- 
cal Works  is  the  one  in  seven  volumes,  owned 
by  Leigh  Hunt,  with  his  notes.  On  the  whole, 
for  the  reader  and  lover  of  poetry  this  is  one 
of  the  most  delightful  books  possible.  Leigh 
Hunt  remembers  what  Keats  and  others  have 
said  by  way  of  criticism,  and  in  the  right 
places  their  words  are  jotted  on  the  margins. 
There  is  one  more  literary  relic  of  Milton,  an 
old  folio  of  his  prose  works,  printed  in  1697; 
nothing  could  be  more  quaint,  more  clumsy, 
more  interesting !  Whether  his  speeches  and 
pamphlets  were  brought  together  previously, 
or  whether  this  is  a  first  edition  of  them  collect- 
ively, I  cannot  say.  The  titles  and  prefaces 
and  heading  are  all  evidently  as  Milton  in- 
tended them  to  be,  and  we  are  invited  into 
his  very  presence  as  we  turn  these  old  pages. 
We  feel  with  Wordsworth  : 


</   .    /,.   »   .4ii>    ^'  '^-UJ^,   .>^.i 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray 


"We  must  be  free  or  die,  who  speak  the  tongue 
That  Shakespeare  spoke  ;  the  faith  and  morals  hold 
Which  Milton  held " 

There    is,  however,  an    older  book    standing 
beneath   this    shelf    than    any   which    has    ever 
stood  upon  it ;    it  is    one  that  fills  mc  with  a 
kind  of  awe  as   I   look  at  it,  yet  which   impels 
me   to   hold    it  with    affection   and    to    read    its 
pages  as  I  read  no  other  "  prophane  "  volume. 
This    book    is  a    copy   of    North's  "  Plutarch," 
printed    in    1603  ;    a    book  which    Shakespeare 
knew    and    which    he    might    have    held.     The 
strong    leather    cover   has    been    patched,    but 
perhaps  not  wholly  remade.     T1ie  bookworms 
have  found  their  way  through  it,  yet  the  pages 
remain    clear    as    the    day    they    were    printed. 
The    name   of    a    former    owner,    who    lived  at 
Bramfield  Hall,  .Suffolk,  is  shnvly  fading  off  the 
title-page,    but    the    stately    title    itself    is    un- 
changed,   and     the     naine    of    "James    Amiot, 
Abbot   of   Bellozane,   Bishop    of    Auxerre,   one 
of  the    King's   privie   Councell    and    great   Am- 
ner-   of   In-ancc"  wlio  translated   these  lines  ot 

*  The  AmiiLi-  (presumably  Almoner)  was  the  highest  eccle- 
siastical dignitary  of  France,  to  whom  was  given  the  super- 
intendence of  hospitals. 


154  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


the  noble  Grecians  and  Romans,  out  of  Greek 
into  French,  appears  in  all  its  majesty,  leading 
in  the  name  of  the  great  English  translator, 
from  French  into  English — Sir  Thomas  North, 
Knight.  It  is  a  most  majestic  old  book,  and 
one  to  be  touched  with  reverence.  It  shows 
no  disdain  to  the  lover  of  pleasure.  Amiot 
says  to  his  readers  :  "  The  reading  of  books 
which  bring  but  a  vain  and  unprofitable 
pleasure  to  the  reader,  is  justly  misliked  of 
wise  and  grave  men.  Againe,  the  reading  of 
such  as  do  but  only  bring  profit,  and  make  the 
reader  in  love  therewith,  and  do  not  ease  the 
paine  of  reading  by  some  pleasantnesse  in 
the  same  ;  do  seeme  somewhat  harsh  to  divers 
delicate  wits.  .  .  .  But  such  books  as  yield 
pleasure  and  profit  .  .  .  have  all  that  a 
man  can  desire."  Both  the  great  Bishop  and 
the  English  Knight  fell  in  love  with  that  book, 
and  spared  no  labor  to  bring  it  to  a  worthy 
presentment  ;  and  to  this  day  the  readers  of 
North's  translation  will  feel  themselves  re- 
warded. 

But  we   must   confess   it   is   not   the    general 
interest  of  the  book  alone  which  attracts  us  to 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  155 

this  volume  :  it  is  the  fact  that  Shakespeare  is 
said  to  have  fed  his  brain  upon  this  story  of 
Julius  Caesar  and  to  have  drawn  his  play  there- 
from. 

We  find  concerning  Caesar  that  "he  was  often 
subject  to  headach,  and  otherwhile  to  the 
falling  sicknesse  (the  which  tooke  him  the  first 
time  as  it  is  reported  in  Corduba,  a  city  of 
Spaine)." 

In  the  play  of  "  Julius  Caesar,"  Cassius  says 
of  him  : 

"He  had  a  fever  when  he   was  in    Spain, 
And  when  the  fit  was  on  him,  I  did  mark 
How  he  did  shake." 

And  again  Casca  says: 

"  He  fell  down  in  the  market-place,  and  foamed  at  the 
mouth  and  was  speechless." 

"Brutus.  'Tis  very  like;  he  hath  the  falling  sick- 
ness." 

We  know  well  that  this  malady  of  Ca:sar 
was  a  matter  of  history,  but  the  likeness  of 
expression    is,   at   the   least,   remarkable. 

In  the  old  volume  we  find  the  storx-  of  the 
defeat  of  the  Nervii,  and  that  the  Roman  Senate 


156  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


decreed  a  sacrifice  and  solemn  processions  for 
fifteen  days,  having  never  made  the  like  ordi- 
nance before  for  any  victory  ;  therefore,  when 
Mark  Antony,  in  the  play,  speaks  to  the  people 
over  the  dead  body  of  Csesar  and  shows  them 
his  mantle,  he  tells  them  it  was  the  one  he 
wore  on  a  summer's  evening  : 

"That  day  he  overcame  the  Nervii." 

Also  the  tale  is  told  of  the  feast  Lupercalia, 
Avhere  Caesar  sat  in  a  chair  of  gold  and  "  Anto- 
nius  was  one  of  them  that  ranne  this  holy 
course  ;  he  came  to  Caesar  and  presented  him 
a  diadeame  wreathed  about  with  laurel. 
But  when  Caesar  refused  the  diadeame,  then 
all  the  people  together  made  an  outcrie  of 
joy." 

The  picturesque  does  not  fail.  We  can  see 
the  kindling  eye  of  a  great  poet  passing  from 
line  to  line  and  gathering  up  the  story  which 
was  to  be  made  permanent  in  the  beauty  of 
his  imagination.  The  soothsayer  is  here ;  the 
"spirits  running  up  and  down  in  the  night"  and 
"  solitaire  birds  to  be  seene  at  noone  daies  sit- 
ting in   the  great   market-place." 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  157 


Further,  we  find  in  the  old  book  that  C;esar, 
doine  sacrifice  unto  the  gods,  found  that  one 
(if  the  beasts  which  w^as  sacrificed  had  no  heart  ; 
and  "  that  it  was  a  strange  thing  in  nature  how 
a  beast  could   live  without  a  heart." 

Shakespeare  wrote : 

"  Enter  a  Servant. 
CcBsar.     What  say  the  augurers  ? 

Servant.     They  would  not  have  you  to  stir  forth  to-day. 
Plucking  the  entrails  of  an  offering  forth, 
They  could  not  find  a  heart  within  the  beast." 

And  then  the  death  of  C.x-sar  with  every 
detail,  and  the  ghost  that  came  to  Brutus,  all 
are   here. 

The  more  carefully  we  read  and  compare  the 
texts,  the  more  surely  we  discover  that  from 
these  pages  (possibly,  wonder  of  wonders,  from 
this  page)  the  poet  we  name  William  Shake- 
speare drew  the  body  of  his  iuimortal  jjlay  of 
"Julius  Citsar." 

We  close  the  great  covers  reverently  and    put 

the  silent  witness  back   under   the   lighter  shelf. 

In    Mr.  Andrew  Lang's  pleasant    book   railed 

"Tin;    I.il)rar\',"   he   speaks    of   tlu:   dilhcultx'   in 

these     decadent    days     of     i)icking     up   literary 


158  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


treasures,  a  thing  so  frequently  done  by  those 
who  knew,  forty,  thirty,  and  even  twcnt}'  years 
ago.  Nevertheless,  we  would  Avhisper,  let  not 
those  who  possess  the  knowledge,  and  the 
opportunity  of  following  the  quest,  lose  all 
hope.  Good  things  may  be  found  even  in 
these  degenerate  days  !  But  thirty  years  ago, 
what  might  not  be  discovered  by  searching  in 
London  or  Paris,  and  sometimes  almost  with- 
out the  excitement  of  the  hunt ! 

For  instance,  upon  this  shelf  stands  a  beauti- 
ful copy  of  "  Rasselas  " — not  a  first  edition,  but 
one  of  the  fine  Ballantyne  reprints  of  1805, 
illustrated  by  Smirke,  with  engravings  by 
Raimbach  ;  quite  good  enough  to  make  the 
eyes  of  the  book-hunter  sparkle. 

Imagine  the  joy  of  the  enthusiastic  buyer, 
having  left  the  shop,  the  book  paid  for  and 
safely  tucked  under  his  arm,  to  find,  as  he 
turned  into  a  quiet  street  to  take  a  look  at  his 
new  purchase,  to  find,  I  say,  hidden  between 
the  leaves  a  letter  in  the  well-known  handwrit- 
ing of  Dr.  Johnson  himself. 

It  was  almost  too  much  to  believe,  and  the 
question   immediately  arose  in  the  young  pub- 


■  S\A, 


iL^Cw(vw|.,5;4j^l.^ 


"      I  ■  ■- 
cvcwv  Vi^^  uL  (w^u  ^jwvU^.  .__ 

•<U    (.IWv  ,  mJ^:  jU.  ^^  <i-    t;4.  4  U   .U  [i^.   <!-  /^ 

Vt        J  J  Jut 


r  written  I 


Ikt.- 


•-»       4 


''♦^.     '7   Yt~ 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  i6i 

lisher's  mind,  "  To  whom   docs   this   letter  be- 
long?"    At  one  moment  the  fortunate  posses- 
sor would  shut  up  the  book  and  start  for  home, 
in  the  next  he   rapidly  retraced   his  steps,  and 
at    last    did    not    pause    until    he    had    again 
reached  the  door  of  the   small   shop  where  his 
purchase  had  been  made.     By  this  time  he  had 
resolved  what  to  do  ;  he  would   first  discover  if 
the  seller  of  the  book  knew  of  the  existence  of 
this  treasure,  and   then    they   could   decide  to- 
gether upon  the  right  step  to  take.     The  book- 
seller was  astonished  at  the  sight  of  the  letter, 
and  confessed   at   once  that  he   could  make  no 
claim  upon  it,  as  he  was   ignorant   of  its   exist- 
ence until  that  moment.      However,  the  matter 
was   soon  settled    to    the    satisfaction   of    both 
parties  ;  they    decided    upon    the   price  such  a 
letter    should   bring,  and  one-half  of  the  value 
was  paid    to    the  bookseller,    who    had   uncon- 
sciously allowed    such   a   prize    to   slip    through 
his  fingers.      In   "My    Friend's     Library,"  the 
letter  appears  in  print    for  the   first   time,  but  a 
fac-simile   is  given  here. 

It   is    addressed    to    the    Rev.   Mr.  Compton, 
who   was   a  Benedictine    monk    li\iiig   in    I'dris 
ir 


162  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


when  Dr.  Johnson  first  went  there,  in  i/zS- 
The  monks  entertained  him  in  the  most 
friendly  way,  givini^  him  one  of  their  own 
cells  for  his  headquarters.  James  Compton 
questioned  Dr.  Johnson  on  the  subject  of  the 
Protestant  faith,  and  asked  if  he  might  come 
to  see  him  in  Bolt  Court.  "  In  the  summer  of 
1782,  he  paid  the  Doctor  a  visit,  and  informed 
him  of  his  desire  to  be  admitted  into  the 
Church  of  England.  Johnson  managed  the 
matter  satisfactorily  for  him,  and  he  was 
received  into  Communion.  .  .  .  Through 
Johnson's  kindness  he  was  nominated  chaplain 
at  the  French  Chapel  of  St.  James. 
Thus  by  the  friendly  hand  of  the  hard-working 
lexicographer,  Mr.  Compton  was  led  from 
poverty  up  to  a  secure  competenc}',  and  a 
place  among  the  influential  dignitaries  of  Lon- 
don society."  Recalling  some  of  the  fine 
humanities  of  the  men  of  that  period,  Thack- 
eray speaks  out  in  a  burst  of  eloquence.  "  O 
you,  fine  gentlemen  !  You  Marches  and  Sel- 
wyns  and  Chesterfields,  how  small  you  look 
by  the  side  of  these  great  men  !  "  And  again, 
after  quoting  "the  verses — the  sacred  verses" 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  163 


on  the  death  of  Levett,  which  it  goes  hardly 
with  me  not  to  copy  again  here,  he  continues : 
"  I  hold  old  Johnson  (and  shall  wc  not  pardon 
James  Boswell  some  errors  for  embalming  him 
for  us?)  to  be  the  great  supporter  of  the  British 
^Monarchy  and  Church  during  the  last  age. 
.  .  .  What  a  humanity  the  old  man  had  ! 
He  was  a  kindly  partaker  of  all  honest  pleas- 
ures. .  .  .  When  he  used  to  frequent  Gar- 
rick's  theatre,  and  had  '  the  liberty  of  the 
scenes,'  he  says,  'All  the  actresses  knew  me, 
and  dropped  me  a  curtsey  as  they  passed  to 
the  stage.'  That  would  make  a  pretty  picture  ; 
it  is  a  pretty  picture  in  my  mind,  of  youth, 
folly,  gayety,  tenderly  surveyed  b\-  wisdom's 
merciful   pure  eyes." 

Standing  with  the  above-mentioned  copy  of 
Rasselas  is  a  "  First  Edition  "  of  "  Johnson's 
Tour  to  the  Hebrides,"  a  book  which  brings 
one  as  near  to  shaking  hands  with  the  author 
as  anything  now  in  existence.  It  wears  a  coat 
of  brown  leather  lined  with  the  marbled  paper 
of  that  period,  and  the  title-page  reads,  "A 
Tour  to  the  Western  Islands  of  Scotland. 
1775."     The    matter   has    that    rare    qualit)-    in 


1 64  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


an  old  book  of  travel,  of  preserving  its  interest 
to  this  day.  The  wild  scenery  of  the  north 
of  Scotland  has  seldom  been  more  vividly 
portrayed.  Sir  Walter  Scott  has  thrown  his 
enchanting  light  upon  it,  and  we  have  seen 
much  in  company  with  the  Princess  of  Thule, 
but  the  truthful  and  often  bald  narratives  of 
the  experiences  of  Johnson  and  Boswell  on  the 
"  Tour  "  are  not  out-worn. 

The  American  reprint  of  the  work  issued  in 
i8io  stands  by  the  side  of  the  original  edition 
with  a  coat  made  to  match  !  Inside  the  cover 
of  the  first  edition  is  written  in  pencil,  "  With 
suppressed  passages ;  see  Davies's  '  Journey 
Round  the  Library  of  a  Bibliomaniac'  "  This 
volume  belonged  to  a  certain  Davies  whose  ini- 
tials are  indistinct,  but  presumably  to  Thomas 
Davies  the  bookseller,  to  whom  there  are  a 
good  many  references  in  the  "  Life  and  Let- 
ters "  of  Johnson.* 

*  Boswell  says  :  "  Mr.  Thomas  Davies,  the  actor,  who  then 
kept  a  bookseller's  shop  in  Russell  Street,  Covent  Garden,  told 
me  that  Johnson  was  very  much  his  friend,  and  came  fre- 
quently to  his  house,  where  he  more  than  once  invited  me  to 
meet  him.    ...    At  last,  on  Monday,  May  i6th,  when  I  was 


Dr.  Samuel  Johnson. 
(Engraved   by  Watson  fronn  portrait  by  Sir  Joshua  Ruynokis,   painted  for  the   Duke  of  Sutherland  in   1770.)» 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  107 


In  the  American  edition  of  the  "Tour"  there 
is  also  a  pencil  inscription  referring"  to  a  beau- 
tiful verse  of  which  Johnson  was  a  sincere  ad- 
mirer— often  was  this  quatrain  quoted  by  the 
lovers  of  true  poetry  who  lingered  a  century 
later  around  the  London  breakfast-table  of 
Samuel  Rogers.  Mr.  Fields  wrote  it  on  this 
fly-leaf  with  a  reference  to  the  page  upon 
which  it  is  introduced.  Boswell  narrates  the 
occasion  as  follows  : 

"  We  came  to  Nairn  to  breakfast ;  though  a 
count}-  town,  and  a  royal  burgh,  it  is  a  miser- 
able place.  Over  the  room  where  we  sat,  a 
girl  was  spinning  wool  with  a  great  wheel,  and 
singing  an  Erse  song:  'I'll  warrant  you'  (said 
Dr.  Johnson) '  one  of  the  songs  of  Ossian.'  He 
then   repeated  these  hnes  : 

'Verse  sweetens  toil,   however  rude  the  sound. 
All  at  her  work  the  village  maiden  sings  : 
Nor  while  she  turns  the  giddy  wheel  around 
Revolves  the  sad  vicissitudes  of  things." 


sitting  in  Mr.  Davies's  back  parlor,  afler  having  drank  tea 
with  him  and  Mrs.  Davies,  Johnson  unexpectedly  came  into 
the  shop.  .  .  .  I  never  pass  by  it  [Boswell  adds  in  a  note] 
without  fcclinL'  reverence." 


168  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


"  I  thought  I  had  heard  these  lines. 

"  '  I  fancy  not,  sir,'  Johnson  replied  ;  '  they 
are  in  a  detached  poem,  the  name  of  which  I 
do  not  remember,  written  by  one  Giffard,  a 
parson.'  " 

This  verse  is  not  a  single  instance  of  the 
manner  in  which  a  perfect  line  or  quatrain,  as 
in  this  case,  will  sometimes  avoid  the  sweeping 
waters  of  oblivion.  Long  after  the  generations 
of  men  who  first  heard  it  and  the  genera- 
tions of  poets  who  loved  it  have  passed  on, 
the  living  verse  still  lingers  to  sweeten  the 
toil  of  life. 

The  latest  editor  of  Johnson's  letters,  Dr. 
Birkbeck  Hill,  who  is  not  easily  foiled  in  any 
research,  determined  to  hunt  up  the  author  of 
the  stanza.  He  discovers  him  to  have  been 
Rev.  Richard  Gifford,  not  Giffard,  who  wrote  a 
poem  called  "  Contemplation,"  two  years  after 
Gray's  "  Elegy,"  and  perhaps  suggested  by  it, 
in  which  the  verse  in  question  occurs.  Mr. 
Gifford  "  mentioned  with  much  satisfaction  that 
Johnson  quoted  the  poem  in  his  Dictionary," 
but  it  is  quoted  with  changes  Avhich  make  it 
the  beautiful  thing  we  know.     Gifford  wrote  : 


Ludiurt    Caotle,    the   sceric   of    Milton  o 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  171 


"  Verse  softens  toil,   however  rude  the  sound  ; 
She  feels  no  biting  pang  the  while  she  sings, 
Nor  as  she  turns  the  giddy  wheel  around 
Revolves  the  sad  vicissitude  of  things." 

Dr.  Johnson  has,  with  a  few  touches,  shown 
us  what  a  poet  can  do  to  help  the  verse  writer. 
The  second  line,  which  is  his  own : 

"  All  at  her  work  the  village  maiden  sings," 

is  a  drama  moving  to  music,  the  centre  and  life 
of  the  verse. 

I  have  elsewhere  referred  to  an  edition  of 
Boswell's  Johnson,  owned  b)-  Leigh  Hunt:  but 
in  this  connection  I  may  speak  of  it  more  fully 
in  relation  to  Dr.  Johnson  and  his  editors. 
Croker,  against  whose  work  Dr.  Birkbeck  Hill 
empties  the  vials  of  his  just  wrath,  has  never- 
theless, b\'  means  of  the  skill  of  John  Murray, 
the  publisher,  made  a  very  pretty  edition  in 
ten  comfortable  little  volumes,  containing  illus- 
trations and  dignities  commensurate  with  the 
name  on  the  title-page:  "The  Right  Honor- 
able John  Wilson  Croker,  M.  P." 

Mr.   Fields   has   pasted    upon    the    fly-leaf    <>f 
the  first  volume  the  following  description    fiom 


172  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


the  Ladies  Magazine,  London,  1784,  December 
20,  of  Dr.  Johnson's  funeral. 

"  This  day,"  the  paragraph  reads,  "  the  re- 
mains of  the  much-lamented  Dr.  Samuel  John- 
son were  interred  in  Westminster  Abbey. 
The  procession,  consisting  of  a  hearse  and  six 
with  the  corpse,  and  ten  mourning  coaches  and 
four,  set  out  from  Bolt  Court,  Fleet  Street,  a 
few  minutes  after  twelve  o'clock,  being  fol- 
lowed by  several  gentlemen's  carriages,  most  of 
the  company  in  which  were  in  mourning.  At 
one  o'clock  the  corpse  arrived  at  the  Abbey, 
where  it  was  met  by  Dr.  Taylor  (who  read  the 
funeral  service)  and  several  prebendaries,  and 
conducted  to  the  Poet's  Corner,  and  laid  close 
to  the  remains  of  David  Garrick,  Esq.  The 
principal  mourners  on  this  solemn  occasion 
were  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  Mr.  Edmund  Burke, 
Sir  John  Hawkins,  Mr.  Coleman,  and  the  de- 
ceased's faithful  black  servant.  There  were 
present  besides.  Dr.  Priestly,  Dr.  Horsley, 
General  Paoli,  and  other  distinguished  persons. 
A  great  concourse  of  people  were  assembled, 
who  behaved  with  a  degree  of  decency  suitable 
to  the  solemn  occasion." 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  173 


The  brevity  and  dignity  of  this  account  con- 
trast with  the  "  scare-heads  "  and  flaming  Hnes 
and  portraits  sometimes  given  in  notices  of  the 
"  great  occasions  "  of  to-day  ;  nevertheless  there 
is  a  nearness  to  facts  and  persons  which  enables 
us  to  review  the  whole  scene. 

In  this  edition  also  there  is  an  engraving 
from  a  portrait  by  Bartolozzi,  of  Dr.  Johnson, 
inserted  in  the  fly-leaf,  which  differs  from  Rey- 
nolds's portraits  by  giving  a  look  of  kindly 
inquiry  to  the  face.  There  is  less  intellectual 
assertion  and  a  gentle  look  of  human  interest 
which  must  have  been  native  to  it  in  certain 
moods,  because  it  belonged  to  his  character. 

The  notes  from  Thomas  Holcroft  also,  to 
which  a  former  reference  has  been  made,  cover 
several  finely  written  pages  in  Leigh  Hunt's 
hand;  their  bearing  is  chiefly  upon  the  charac- 
ter of  lioswell,  from  whose  snobbishness  Hol- 
croft had  evidently  sufi"ered.  Miss  Mitford  * 
gives    the    sketch    of    the     life    and    historx'    of 

*Miss  Mitford's  paper  upon  Thomas  Holcroft  may  be  foiiiul 
in  her  "Recollections  of  a  Literary  Life."  She  speaks  of  his 
memoirs,  begun  by  himself  and  concluded  by  Ilazlilt,  as  being 
a  very  curious  history,  both  for  the  vicissitudes  of  the  life  and 
the  indomitable  character  of  the  man. 


174  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Holcroft,  who  was  a  man  of  great  talent ;  but 
being  the  son  of  a  shoemaker,  he  suffered  more 
keen!}'  from  Boswell's  meanness  than  others 
who  have  written  of  him  from  more  favorable 
points  of  view.  Sastres,  an  Italian,  is  also 
quoted  as  disliking  Boswell,  and  Hunt  remarks 
that  "the  omission  of  Boswell's  name  in  John- 
son's will  is  remarkable  and,  I  cannot  but 
think,  very  damaging."  All  the  extracts  from 
Holcroft  are  worthy  to  be  read  as  a  part  of  the 
history  of  the  time,  and  of  individuals  who  have 
made  that  time  memorable. 

Leigh  Hunt's  notes  usually  have  something 
which  makes  them  interesting;  they  do  not 
possess  always  the  highest  value,  by  any  means, 
but  there  is  either  a  personal  or  a  literary  flavor 
about  them  which  will  doubtless  give  most  of 
them  a  place  in  the  editions  of  the  future.  For 
instance,  where  Johnson  is  speaking  of  his  first 
London  lodgings  and  says,  "  It  used  to  cost  the 
rest  a  shilling  for  their  dinner,  for  they  drank 
wine ;  but  I  had  a  cut  of  meat  for  sixpence, 
and  bread  for  a  penny,  and  gave  the  waiter  a 
penny;  so  that  I  was  quite  as  well  served,  nay, 
better   than    the  rest,  for  they  gave  the  waiter 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  173 


nothing."  "Lord  Byron,"  says  Leigh  Hunt  in 
a  note,  "  in  repeating  this  story,  of  which  he 
was  fond,  used  to  dwell  upon  these  particular 
w^ords,  '  a  cut  of  meat,'  with  great  and  pleasant 
gusto."  This  scrap  gives  us  a  glimpse  of  the 
every-day  Byron,  and  reminds  us  of  another 
exclamation  of  his,  quoted  by  one  of  his  biogra- 
phers, that  he  hated  to  see  women  eat. 

There  would  be  a  much  greater  pleasure  in 
turning  over  the  old  pages  of  what  is  now  a 
very  rare  book,  "Anecdotes  of  Dr.  Johnson  by 
Mrs.  Piozzi,"  if  our  faith  in  that  lady  had  not 
been  ver\-  rudely  shaken  of  late  by  certain 
newly-found  letters.  But  it  smacks  of  the 
dailv  life  of  the  great  man,  and  must  always 
be  precious  to  us,  remembering  the  days  and 
hours  he  passed  in  affectionate  intercourse 
under  the  roof  of  Mrs.  Thrale.  Wc  must  take 
the  bitter  with  the  sweet  when  we  accept  such 
benefactions  as  were  conferred  upon  the  world 
by  herself  and  James  Boswell ;  and  if  we  arc 
sometimes  inclined  to  feel  that  we  wish  to 
hear  nothinir  further  from  either  of  these  per- 
sonages,  let  us  reflect  for  one  instant  what  the 
world  of  letters  would  suffer  if  their  work  were 


176  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


withdrawn.  Let  us  recall  what  Johnson  him- 
self said,  quoted  by  Mrs.  Piozzi  in  this  same 
book  :  "  The  cup  of  life  is  surely  bitter  enough 
without  squeezing  in  the  hateful  rind  of 
resentment." 

He  was  indebted  to  Mrs.  Thrale  for  a  delight- 
ful house  of  refuge,  and  if  in  later  years  she 
was  less  kind  to  him  than  the  angels,  he  was 
not  ungrateful  nor  willing  to  think  ill  of  her. 
There  are  one  or  two  extant  portraits  of  her, 
but  in  the  picture  by  Hogarth  called  "  The 
Lady's  Last  Stake,"  her  features  are  said  by 
some  adventurous  believers  in  the  legend  to 
be  more  truly  portrayed  than  anywhere  else. 
Miss  Lynch  was  about  eighteen  years  old  when 
she  sat  to  Hogarth  for  the  figure  in  this  pic- 
ture. It  was  engraved  at  Lord  Macaulay's 
suggestion  in  1861,  for  Hayward's  edition  of 
the  "Autobiography  of  Mrs.   Piozzi." 

Johnson  used  to  say  that  "  the  size  of  a 
man's  understanding  might  always  be  justly 
measured  by  his  mirth."  His  own  love  of  wit 
and  humor  found  scope  and  appreciation  in  his 
friendship  with  Garrick.  The  life  of  the  great 
actor  by  Arthur  Mur])hy,  printed  in   Red   Lion 


178  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 

Passaere  in  1801,  is  likclv  to  be  rather  a  rare 
book  now.  It  contains  a  copy  of  the  fine 
portrait  of  Garrick  by  Reynolds,  engraved  by 
Schiavonetti,  and  is  in  itself  most  pleasant 
reading."  Here  we  find  Dr.  Johnson  and  Gar- 
rick sjoins  to  London  together,  the  former  Avith 
a  tragedy  in  his  pocket ;  here  we  find  descrip- 
tions of  the  great  actresses  of  the  period,  of 
Mrs.  Gibber,  Mrs.  Woffington,  Mrs.  Pritchard, 
Mrs.  Abington,  Mrs.  Glive,  and  the  rest  of  that 
delightful  galaxy  ;  all  of  them  only  too  glad  to 
share  the  stage  and  the  applause  with  Garrick. 
And  here  also  we  find  Johnson  writing  a  Pro- 
logue for  his  friend  "  in  a  stile,  if  we  except 
Pope's  to  the  tragedy  of  '  Cato,'  superior  to 
everything  of  the  kind  in  the  English  lan- 
guage." 

Garrick  at  length  brought  out   Dr.  Johnson's 

*  The  Athencium  of  May,  1894,  says,  in  commenting  upon 
a  new  and  excellent  Life  of  Garrick,  just  published,  that 
"Tom  Davies's  volumes  are  interesting  and  perfectly  unaf- 
fected ;  Murphy's,  a  turgid  performance,  amusing  from  its 
florid  bursts,  but  valueless  from  its  emptiness  of  facts  and 
details." 

Valueless  it  may  be  to  the  lovers  of  research,  but  full  of 
the  flavor  of  contemooraneous  writing. — .\.  F. 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray 


179 


tragedy  of  "  Irene,"  but  although  it  held  the 
stage  nine  nights,  "  the  united  powers  of  Gar- 
riek,  Barry,  Mrs.  Gibber,  and  Mrs.  Pritchard 
could  not  raise  it  into   vogue."* 

"The  celebrated  Dr.  Smollett,"  too,  appears 
upon  the  stage  of  life  presented  in  these  pages, 


Garrick  s  Villa. 


with  a  farce  in  his  hand  which  seems  to  have 
made  no  great  effect.  Altogether,  Arthur  Mur- 
phy   produced     a     friendly    book,    and    he    was 


*  Byron  wrote  : 

"A  haltered  heroine  Johnson  sought  to  slay; 
We  saved  Irene,  but    half  damned  the  play." 


I  So  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


evidently   quite    worthy    of    the    strong  Hking 
which   Dr.  Johnson  had   for  him.* 

One  good  thing  among  others  which  should 
have  been  in  his  pages,  he  has  failed  to  record. 
There  is  an  epigram  made  by  one  of  the  wits  of 
the  period,  which  was  often  upon  Mr.  Fields's 
lips  when  the  actors  of  that  day  were  discussed  ; 
it  refers  to  the  rivalry  between  Garrick  and 
Barry  at  the  time  when  "  the  town  "  was  di- 
vided upon  the  subject  of  their  merits.  The 
author  of  the  verses  is  not  known, f  but  they 
read   as   follows : 

"The  town  has  found  out  diff'rent  ways 

To  praise  the  diff'rent  Lears  ; 
To  Barry  they  give  loud  huzza's  ! 

To  Garrick  only  tears.:}: 

*  It  was  Arthur  Murphy  who  first  introduced  Dr.  Johnson  to 
Mrs.  Thrale,  and  doubtless  the  sentiment  of  gratitude  also 
mingled  with  his  liking  for  the  young  man. 

f  Since  writing  the  above  a  friendly  correspondent  informs 
me  that  the  author  is  Rev.  Richard  Kendal,  of  Peterhouse, 
Cambridge,  and  refers  me  to  Dodd's  "  Epigrammatists."  In 
the  "Life  of  Garrick,"  by  Percy  Fitzgerald,  the  lines  are 
attributed  to  one  "  Mr.  P)erenger." 

■\.  A  slight  difference  will  be  seen  in  the  reading  of  this  first 
stanza,  as  found  in  the  old  renderings  and  in  the  verse  as  it 
stands   in  "Yesterdays  with  Authors."     In   the  latter  version, 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  i8i 


"  A  king  !    ay,  every  inch  a  king, 
Such  Barry  doth  appear  ; 
But  Garrick's  quite  another  thing, 
He's  every  inch  King  Lear  !  " 

The  verses  and  Johnson's  favorite  stanza, 
quoted  above,  both  carry  us  to  the  breakfast 
table  of  the  poet  Rogers,  where  these  good 
things  were  to  be  heard,  having  been  stored 
away  in  his  capacious  memory.  Rogers  was 
very  friendly  to  the  young  American  publisher 
from  the  first  moment  of  their  acquaintance, 
and  it  was  at  one  of  these  famous  breakfasts 
that  he  called  his  old  attendant  Edmund  to  his 
side,  and  bade  him  bring  a  copy  of  his  poems 
to  present  to   ^^Ir.  Fields. 

which  was  repeated  from  a  memory  of  Rogers's  recitation,  we 

find  it  set  down  as  follows  : 

"  The  town  have  chosen  different  ways 
To  praise  their  different  Lears  : 
To  r>arry  they  give  loud  applause — 
To  Garrick  only  tears." 

Surely  there  is  better  grammar  as  well  as  a  flavor  of  the 
antique  in  the  old  stanza  which  is  delightful  and  superior  to 
this.  The  second  stanza  I  have  been  unable  to  find  in  the 
older  records  of  that  time,  although  it  may  be  in  the  Life  of 
Garrick  by  Tom  Davies,  which  I  have  not  at  hand. 


1 82  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


e 


e 


When  the  man  returned  he  handed  Rogers 
the  small  edition  ;  he  was  again  despatched  to 
find  one  of  the  beautiful  copies  in  two  volumes 
which  were  already  famous  for  their  exquisite 
illustrations  and  book-making.  This  edition 
will  long  be  a  model  for  its  perfect  binding  and 
printing,  apart  from  the  uncommon  excellence 
of  the  reproductions  of  original  designs,  mad 
for  Rogers  chiefly  by  Stothard  and  Turner 
The  pictures  from  which  the  engravings  wer 
made,  by  Goodall,  Finden,  and  others,  already 
adorned  the  walls  of  his  house.  The  external 
beauty  of  these  volumes  almost  makes  one  for- 
get to  speak  of  their  contents ;  but  any  true 
lover  of  letters  will  rejoice  in  the  scholarly 
character  of  the  verses,  and  will  find  the  notes 
most  interesting  reading. 

The  word  "  scholarly "  easily  leads  us  to 
Gray,  whose  work  was  especially  venerated 
by  the  owner  of  this  library.  During  Mr. 
Fields's  first  visit  to  England,  Stoke  Pogis, 
where  Gray  lies  buried,  was  one  of  the  places 
he  chose  to  visit,  and  where  we  find  him  in 
the  twilight  copying  the  inscription  from  the 
monument.     Later  in  life  he  came  into  posses- 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  183 

sion  of  two  books  which  belonged  to  Gray, 
both  of  them  containing  interesting  autographs 
and   notes. 

His  sincere  admiration  of  the  poet  led  him  to 
gather  everything  which  fell  in  his  wav  belong- 
ing  to  his  work  or  to  his  life.  Amoni:  these 
relics  is  an  autograph  fragment,  consisting  of 
many  pages  of  a  chronological  history  which 
Gray  was  preparing  at  the  time  of  his  death. 
The  clear,  neat  writing  is  to  be  envied  ;  there 
is  no  mistaking  the  letters,  nor  arc  they 
cramped  nor  formal.  There  is  also  an  old 
quarto  volume  containing  "The  Poems  of  Mr. 
Gray,  to  which  are  prefixed  Memoirs  of  his 
Life  and  Writings,  by  \V.  Mason,  M.A.."  1775. 
As  Gray  lived  to  1771,  this  is  probably  the  first 
edition  of  his  life  and  works  given  to  the  world. 
Prefixed  to  the  poems  stand  these  words  of 
■Quinctilian  :  "  Multum  et  vera;  gloricU,  quamvis 
uno   libro,    meruit." 

It  would  be  a  weariness  to  the  reader,  were 
the  various  editions  and  readings  of  Gray,  scat- 
tered through  other  shelves,  to  be  enumerated  ; 
— some  (juaint,  others  magnificent  "specimens 
of    book-making,"    others    simply    a    "last    edi- 


1 84  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


tion."  But  they  bear  witness  to  the  love  of  at 
least  one  reader  in  spite  of  the  devouring  waves 
of  a  whole  century  of  time. 

Mr.  Fields  mentions,  in  "  My  Friend's  Li- 
brary," the  volume  of  "  The  Rape  of  the 
Lock,"  which  belonged  to  Charles  Lamb. 
The  missing  pages  torn  from  the  little  book 
(for  which  it  appears  Lamb  paid  sixpence)  are 
restored  in  his  own  beautiful  handwriting.  It 
seems  to  bring  us  somewhat  nearer  to  Lamb, 
to  find  that  thirteen  years  after  his  death,  when 
Mr.  Fields  was  calling  upon  Moxon,  the  pub- 
lisher— who  married,  it  will  be  remembered, 
Emma  Isola,  the  adopted  child  of  Charles  and 
Mary  Lamb — Moxon  showed  his  American 
friend  the  remnant  of  Elia's  library,  and  gave 
him  at  the  same  time  this  precious  book  from 
the  collection.*     A   new  and   beautiful  edition 

*  Mr.  Fields  says  :  "  Perhaps  the  most  interesting  to  me 
of  all  the  private  libraries  I  have  ever  seen  in  England,  was 
the  small  collection  of  Charles  and  Mary  Lamb,  which  Ed- 
ward Moxon,  the  publisher,  unlocked  for  me  when  I  was  first 
in  England,  before  the  books  were  dispersed,  as  they  never 
ought  to  have  been.  Then  and  there  I  lovingly  handled  his 
Kit  Marlowe,  his  Drummond  of  Hawthornden,  his  Drayton, 
his  Cowley,  and  his  Burton  !     I  remember  how  Moxon's  whole 


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Fac-simile  of  a  Letter  from  Charles  Lamb. 


1 86  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


of  Lamb's  works,  edited  by  Thomas  Noon  Tal- 
fourd,  had  then  been  published  only  a  few 
years  (1840).  It  was  evidently  one  of  Mr. 
Fields's  most  valued  books.*  He  also  managed 
to  find  a  copy  of  "  Mrs.  Leicester's  School,"  by 
Mary  Lamb,  to  which,  Talfourd  says,  "  Lamb 
contributed  three  of  the  tales.  The  best,  how- 
family  stood  around  that  '  Life  of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  by 
his  Duchess,'  and  told  stories  of  Lamb's  enthusiasm  over  the 
book,  a  volume  about  which  he  has  written  :  '  No  casket  is 
rich  enough,  no  casing  sufficiently  durable  to  honor  and  keep 
safe  such  a  jewel."" 

*  Everything  connected  with  Lamb  has  such  human  interest, 
and  the  portraits  of  him  are  so  unsatisfactory,  that  the  follow- 
ing description  of  his  person  by  Leigh  Hunt,  who  knew  him 
intimately,  is  of  value  to  modern  readers.  Leigh  Hunt  says : 
"  Charles  Lam.b  had  a  head  worthy  of  Aristotle,  with  as  fine 
a  heart  as  ever  beat  in  human  bosom,  and  limbs  very  fragile 
to  sustain  it.  There  was  a  caricature  of  him  sold  in  the 
shops,  which  pretended  to  be  a  likeness.  Procter  (Barry 
Cornwall)  went  into  the  shop  in  a  passion,  and  asked  the  man 
what  he  meant  by  putting  forth  such  a  libel.  The  man 
apologized,  and  said  that  the  artist  meant  no  offense.  There 
never  was  a  true  portrait  of  Lamb.  His  features  were 
strongly  yet  delicately  cut  ;  he  had  a  fine  eye  as  well  as 
forehead  ;  and  no  face  carried  in  it  greater  marks  of  thought 
and  feeling.  It  resembled  that  of  Bacon,  with  less  worldly 
vigor  and  more  sensibility." 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  187 


ever,  are  his  sister's  as  he  delighted  to  insist ; 
and  no  tales  more  happily  adapted  to  nurture 
all  sweet  and  childlike  feelings  in  children  were 
ever  written."  We  of  a  later  century  do  not 
concur  \\ith  Lamb's  estimate,  especialh-  when 
we  read  that  lovely  tale  about  going  to  church, 
which  is  a  model,  and  the  despair  of  N'oung 
story  writers.  "  The  Poetry  for  Children,"  an- 
other joint  publication,  is  safely  kept  among 
the  beloved  treasures,  also  Lamb's  "  Ulysses." 
These  are  all  pretty  little  books,  and  early 
editions,  though  probabh'  not  the  first.  One 
of  the  autograph  letters  of  Lamb,  laid  among 
these  memorials,  has  an  amusing  anecdote  con- 
nected with  its  transfer  to  our  shelf.  Barr\' 
Cornwall  (Mr.  Procter)  was  talking  of  Lamb, 
one  day,  with  Mr.  Fields,  speaking  of  his  own 
tender  love  for  him  and  looking  over  his  letters. 
"  I  will  give  you  this  one  I  "  he  said.  "  Cram 
it  into  your  pocket,  for  I  hear  my  wife  coming 
down  stairs,  and  perhaps  she  won't  let  you 
carr)^   it   off." 

Mrs.  Procter  was  for  the  larger  i)art  of  a 
century  one  of  the  most  brilliant  women  in 
London  society.     Dickens  said  of  her  th;it   no 


1 88  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


matter  how  brilliant  the  men  were  who  sur- 
rounded her — and  they  were  all  that  London 
had  of  the  best — she  always  gave  the  last  and 
wittiest  rejoinder.  Her  powers  of  social  endur- 
ance were  wonderful.  The  Saturday  Review 
said  of  her  that  "  Lady  Kew  herself,  whom  Mrs. 
Procter  did  not  otherwise  resemble,  was  not 
a  more  indefatigable  diner-out  and  attendant 
at  evening  parties.  ...  It  was  intellectual 
society  which  she  enjoyed  and  to  which  she 
contributed  at  least  as  much  as  she  derived 
from  it.  .  .  .  The  graphic  simplicity  with 
which  she  told  her  stories  was  beyond  all 
praise.  .  .  .  Her  crisp,  sharp  sentences 
were  a  rebuke  to  the  mumbled  sins  against 
sense  and  grammar  which  too  often  pass  mus- 
ter for  English  conversation.  .  .  .  Mrs. 
Procter  might  have  repeated  with  absolute 
sincerity  the  touching  lines  of  Lamb.  She 
warmed  both  hands  before  the  fire  of  life, 
and  when  it  sank  she  was  ready  to  depart." 
The  last  time  I  had  the  pleasure  of  seeing 
her,  she  had  long  passed  her  eightieth  birthday. 
She  had  "  assisted  "  in  the  morning  at  a  mar- 
riage in  the  family  of  Lord  Houghton  ;  she  had 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  189 


lunched  in  company ;  she  was  holding  a  recep- 
tion at  her  own  house,  and,  in  speaking  with 
a  young  lady  who  was  taking  leave,  I  heard 
her  say  :  "But  I  shall  see  you  this  evening!" 
"  No,"  said  the  young  lady ;  "  I  am  rather 
tired  after  our  day,  and  I  shall  not  go  out 
again."  "  Nonsense,  my  child,"  answered  the 
old  soldier.  "  Why,  I  am  going  to  dine  out 
first,  and  go  to  the  reception  afterward.  What 
is  the   matter  with   you   young   people?" 

When  she  passed  away,  a  few  years  ago,  the 
world  lost  almost  the  last  person  acquainted 
nearly  and  socially  with  the  brilliant  group  of 
poets  who  made  the  first  quarter  of  the  cen- 
tury an  epoch  in  English  literature.  The 
London  Academy  said  of  her  :  "  By  her  mother's 
marriage  with  Basil  Montagu,  she  was  brought, 
when  quite  a  child,  into  contact  with  Lamb 
and  Coleridge,  Keats  and  Leigh  Hunt,  and 
other  men  of  note,  who  frequented  the  house 
of  the  editor  of  Bacon,  and  she  speedily  learned 
to  hold  her  own  among  the  wits,  her  masterful 
and  clear  intellect  early  asserting  itself.  By 
her  own  marriage  with  Barry  Cornwall,  whose 
'Mirandola'  had  three  years  before  stirred  the 


190  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


town,  with  Macready  in  the  title  part,  and 
Charles  Kemble  as  Guido,  she  cemented  her 
connection  with  the  world  of  letters,  and  be- 
came the  close  friend  of  a  younger  generation 
—of  Thackeray  and  Dickens,  the  Laureate  and 
Mr.  Browning.  She  survived  to  be  looked  up  to 
with  respect  and  curiosity  by  a  third  genera- 
tion, to  whom  the  friends  of  her  youth  were 
English  classics,  quietis  ascripti  ordiuibns  Dco- 
runi.  Not  that  Mrs.  Procter  was  at  all  a  mere 
repository  of  reminiscences.  She  took  a  keen 
interest  in  the  topics  of  the  day,  and  her  talk 
was  admirable,  both  for  what  she  said  and 
the  way  in  which  she  said  it.  She  held  strong 
opinions  of  her  own  on  most  subjects,  and 
about  most  people,  and  often  her  expression 
of  them  was  more  emphatic  than  cautious,  and 
this  earned  her  a  reputation  for  bitterness  she 
did  not  deserve,  for  she  was  essentially  kind- 
hearted." 

Mrs.  Procter  had  at  one  time  written  down 
a  number  of  recollections  of  the  eminent  men 
she  had  known  ;  but  she  was  so  shocked  by 
the  posthumous  publication  of  Carlyle's  '  Remi- 
niscences,'   that    she    is    believed    to    have    de- 


J    j'Aat/i,     ^T^.       ^c/7ftCjTt^     -,     (jyp^    /Xivt,     ^-nc^<*  h 


<^o    .»^    ^      ^.^^     ^<^/^;     ^^ 


^g^tyf^ 


Fac-simile  of  a  portion  of  a  letter  from   Mrs.  Procter. 


192  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


stroyed  her  diaries  as  well  as  the  letters  in 
her  possession.  Thackeray's  letters  to  her, 
which  were  numerous  and  interesting,  were 
thus  irrevocably  lost  among  the  rest. 

Lowell,  who  saw  Mrs.  Procter  frequently, 
was,  of  course,  justly  esteemed  by  her  as  one 
of  the  most  delightful  of  all  her  shining  com- 
pany. "  Something  might  be  written  about 
her,"  he  said  when  the  news  of  her  death 
came  to  America.  But  unless  Mr.  Henry  James 
can  do  it  for  us,  we  now  seem  to  lack  the 
mental  camera  which  will  throw  on  paper 
the  portrait  of  this  distinguished  woman  as  she 
moved  through  a  long  half-century  of  London 
society. 

In  one  of  Mrs.  Procter's  letters  to  Mr.  Fields, 
after  her  husband's  death,  she  says  :  "  You 
knew  and  loved  my  dear  one  !  He  never  blew 
his  own  trumpet,  and  the  foolish  world  requires 
you  to  say,  '  Fall  down,  adore  me  ;  I  am  the 
cleverest  man  living.'  There  is  a  true  story  of 
Sydney  Smith  and  Macaulay.  The  latter  had 
been  on  a  visit  to  the  great  wit,  and,  on  seeing 
him  off  in  the  stage-coach,  he  said  :  "  Farewell, 
Macaulay  ;    let   no  man  persuade  you  that  you 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  193 


are  not  the  q-reatest  man  in  the  world.  .  .  . 
The  fault  of  the  memoirs  is  that  there  are  no 
letters  of  my  husband's.  Foster  had  destroyed 
his,  and  the  Brownings'  also.  .  .  .  And  his 
letters  to  me  were  too  tender  to  be  printed 
in  m}-  lifetime. 

"  Your  old   friend, 

"  Anna  B.  Procter." 

Queen  Anne's  Mansion, 
S.  W.  London. 

We  have  left  Charles  and  Mary  Lamb  while 
we  hold  the  letter  of  the  former  in  our  hands, 
in  order  to  speak  of  the  donors  ;  but  we  cannot 
willingly  leave  them  yet  altogether.  Near  by 
are  the  letters  and  books  and  manuscripts  of 
Charles  and  Mary  Cowden  Clarke,  who  knew 
Lamb,  and  through  whom  we  have,  as  it  were, 
been  in  touch  with  him.  Mrs.  Cowden  Clarke 
says  of  Lamb:  "It  seems  as  if  it  were  )'ester- 
day  that  I  noted  his  eager  way,  when  he  was 
at  Margate,  of  telling  me  about  an  extraortli- 
narily  large  whale  that  had  been  captured 
there  ;  of  its  having  created  Iivel\'  interest  in 
the  place  ;  of  its  ha\ing  been  conve}'cd  away 
13 


194  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 

in  a  strong  cart,  on  which  it  lay  a  huge  mass 
of  colossal  height  ;  when  he  added,  with  one  of 
his  sudden  droll,  penetrating  glances,  '  The  eye 
has  just  gone  past   our  window.'  " 

In  one  of  his  letters  he  says:  "Your  books 
are  as  the  gushing  of  streams  in  a  desert.  By 
the  way,  you  have  sent  no  autobiographies. 
Your  letter  seems  to  imply  you  had.  Nor 
do  I  want  any.  Cowden,  they  are  of  the 
books  which  I  give  away."  A  copy  of  the 
final  "  Memorials  of  Lamb,"  given  to  Mr. 
Fields  by  Moxon,  begins  to  look  like  one  of 
the  books  of  which  Lamb  was  fond.  He 
used  to  hu"  a  rare  folio  all  the  nearer  to  his 
heart  for  its  worn  edges  and  shabby  binding. 

Talfourd  speaks  in  this  book  of  the  London 
Magazine  as  being  the  exciting  cause  of  the 
"  Essays  of  EHa."  Even  in  those  days,  it 
appears,  a  great  stimulus  was  given  to  the 
world  of  literature  by  the  creation  of  a  mag- 
azine ;  and  we  cannot  fail  to  look  with  interest 
upon  the  tall  ragged  volumes  of  TJie  Tattler, 
The  London  Journal  and  other  survivors  of 
those  times. 

The   London    Magazine     itself,  however,  pre- 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  195 


sents  a  noble  front,  perfect  in  its  line  and 
brave  in  leather  binding,  with  gilt  letters. 
"  Never,"  says  Talfourd,  "  was  a  periodical 
work  commenced  with  happier  auspices.  .  .  . 
There  was  Lamb,  at  his  indiscreetest,  best ; 
Barr)-  Cornwall,  .  .  .  streaking  the  darkest 
passion  with  beauty ;  John  Hamilton  Rey- 
nolds, .  .  .  and  Hazlitt,  who  was  giving 
some  of  his  best  work  to  the  world  for  the 
first  time  through  this  medium."  The  name 
of  John  Hamilton  Reynolds  is  sailing  safely 
down  to  posterity  upon  the  wing  of  Keats. 
The  following  exquisite  verses  are  among  the 
poems  which  are  connected  with  his  name. 
These  lines  are  too  little  known.  Buxton 
Forman  says :  "  Keats  seems  to  have  been 
really  writing  in  a  kind  of  spiritual  parallel- 
ism with  the  thrush's  song,  .  .  .  following 
in  a  sense  the  bird's  methods  of  repetition." 
Therefore  he  entitles  them,  "  What  the  Thrush 
said:  Lines  from  a  Letter  to  John  Hamilton 
Re}-nolds  " : 

"O  tliou   whose  face  hath  felt  the  winter's  wind, 
Whose  eye  hath  seen  the  snow-clouds  hum,-^  in  mist, 
And  the  black  elm  tops  'monjr  the  freezing-  stars. 


196  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


To  thee  the  spring  will  be  a  harvest  time  ; 

O  thou,  whose  only  book  has  been  the  light 

Of  supreme  darkness  which  thou  feddest  on 

Nisht  after  nig-ht  when  Phoebus  was  away, 

To  thee  the  spring  shall  be  a  triple  morn. 

O  fret  not  after  knowledge  ;  I  have  none. 

And  yet  my  song  comes  native  with  the  warmth. 

O  fret  not  after  knowledge  ;   I  have  none. 

And  yet  the  evening  listens.     He  who  saddens 

At  thought  of  idleness  cannot  be  idle, 

And  he's  awake  who  thinks  himself  asleep." 

In  the  year  1796  a  small  book  was  printed 
with  the  title  "  Original  Letters,  etc.,  of  Sir 
John  Falstaff."  The  copy  before  me  bears 
the  inscription  "  See  Charles  Lamb's  reference 
to  this  little  book."  Following  this  lead,  we 
find  in  Talfourd's  life  that  it  was  written  by 
"Jem  White,"  of  whose  humor  Lamb  once 
said,  "There  never  was  the  like!  We  never 
shall  see  such  days  as  those  in  which  Jem 
flourished." 

"All  that  now  remains  of  Jem,"  Talfourd 
continues,  "  is  the  celebration  of  the  supper 
which  he  gave  to  the  young  chimney  sweep- 
ers, in  the  Elia  of  his  friend,  and  a  thin  duo- 
decimo   volume   which   he    published    in    1796, 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  197 


under  the  title  of  '  The  Letters  of  John  Fal- 
staff,'  with  a  dedication  (printed  in  black  let- 
ter) to  Master  Samuel  Irelaunde,  which  those 
who  knew  Lamb  at  the  time  believed  to  be 
his."  "  White's  Letters,"  said  Lamb,  in  writing 
to  a  friend  about  this  time,  "  are  near  publica- 
tion. His  frontispiece  is  a  good  conceit;  Sir 
John  learning  to  dance  to  please  Madame 
Page,  in  dress  of  doublet,  etc.,  from  the  upper 
half,  and  modern  pantaloons,  with  shoes  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  from  the  low^er  half,  and 
the  whole  work  is  full  of  goodly  quips  and 
rare  fancies,  '  all  deftly  masked  like  poor  an- 
tiquity. 

It  is  said  that  Lamb  never  found  one  of 
these  little  books  in  a  stall,  or  thrown  aside 
among  a  pile  of  unsalable  waitings,  that  he 
did  not  buy  it.  He  could  always  get  it  for 
sixpence  a  copy.  Li  this  way  he  kept  all  his 
friends  provided.  In  writing  to  Manning,  to 
whom  he  had  evidently  sent  a  copy,  he  says  : 
"  I  hope  by  this  time  you  are  prepared  to 
sav  the  '  Falstaff  Letters'  arc  a  bundle  of 
the  sharpest,  queerest,  profoundest  humorous, 
of    any   these    juice-drained    latteT    times    have 


198  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


spawned."  It  is  rather  a  curious  fact,  also, 
that  there  was  an  American  reprint  of  these 
"Letters"  in  181 3,  nearly  eighteen  years  after 
their  issue,  because  we  cannot  help  whisper- 
ing, in  spite  of  Charles  Lamb's  enthusiasm  for 
his  friend's  work,  that  they  seem  to  good 
judges  at  this  period  to  be  quite  unreadable. 
Southey,  Moxon,  Talfourd,  and  Ainger  all 
seem  to  agree  that  Lamb  had  a  hand  in  the 
editorship,  and  surely  the  preface  is  full  of  his 
wit.  It  is  a  precious  little  book,  because 
Lamb  loved  it,  and  Mr.  Fields  wrote  inside, 
"  Oh,  be  careful  of  it !  " 

As  I  lay  this  favorite  relic  aside,  my  eye  is 
caught  by  the  poems  of  Katherine  Philips, 
"The  Matchless  Orinda,"  whose  folio,  pub- 
lished in  1678,  is  at  hand.  I  fear  the 
poems  of  this  lady  might  have  been  over- 
looked in  this  age  of  many  books,  if  the  appre- 
ciation of  a  great  poet  had  not  rescued  her 
from  oblivion.  In  one  of  Keats's  letters  to 
Reynolds  he  says :  "  I  had  longed  for  some 
real  feminine  modesty  in  these  things,  and  was 
therefore  gladdened  in  the  extreme  on  open- 
ing, the   other   day,  a   book   of    poetry   written 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  199 


by  one  beautiful  Miss  Philips,  a  friend  of 
Jeremy  Taylor's,  and  called  'The  Matchless 
Orinda.'  You  must  have  heard  of  her,  and 
most  likely  read  her  poetry.  I  wish  you  hav^c 
not,  that  I  may  have  the  pleasure  of  treating 
you  with  a  few  stanzas."  He  took  the  pains 
to  transcribe  one  of  the  poems  in  full,  the 
same  that  Buxton  Forman  copies  in  the  .Ap- 
pendix to  his  "  Life  of  Keats,"  and  Lord 
Houghton  reproduced  in  1848,  and,  of  course, 
Sidney  Colvin   later. 

These  poems  of  Katherine  Philips  have  had 
a  strange  history.  Some  years  before  her 
death  a  surreptitious  edition  had  been  printed 
without  her  knowledge,  and  was  upon  the  eve 
of  being  issued  to  the  public  when  the  fraud 
was  discovered  through  the  agency  of  a  friend. 
In  spite  of  every  possible  precaution,  it  appears 
that  many  of  the  copies  were  sold  afterward. 
She  writes  a  letter  to  the  friend  who  did  her 
the  kind  ofifice  to  withdraw  the  stolen  volume 
from  the  public,  saying :  "  This  is  a  most  cruel 
accident,  and  hath  made  so  proportionate  an 
impression  on  me,  that  really  it  hath  cost  me 
a  sharp  fit  of  sickness  since  I  heard  it."     Not 


200  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


many  years  later  she  was  snatched  out  of  life 
by  the  ravaging  small-pox,  at  the  age  of  thirty- 
one.  After  her  death  the  effort  was  made  to 
publish  her  poems  correctly,  but  with  limited 
success,  because  they  lacked  her  own  revision. 
The  portrait  of  her,  also,  is  said  to  be  "  not 
very  like  her,  only  a  poor  paper-shadow."  But 
the  poems  themselves  have  the  true  poetic  life 
in  them  which  Keats's  keen  sense  discerned. 
The  poem  which  he  chiefly  loved  is  written 
to  "  Mrs.  Mary  Aubrey  at  Parting,"  and  con- 
tains verses  of  the  most  exquisite  beauty.  It 
would  take  too  much  space  to  transcribe  the 
whole  poem  here,  but  we  cannot  pass  on  with- 
out o-ivinsr  one  or  two  of  the  stanzas: 

"  And  thus  we  can  no  al:)sence  know, 

Nor  shall  we  be  confined  ; 
Our  active  souls  will  daily  go 

To  learn  each  other's  mind. 
Nay.  should  we  never  meet  to  sense, 
Our  souls  would  hold  intelligence. 

"  By  my  own  temper  I  sliall  guess 
At  thy  felicity, 
And  only  like  my  happiness 
Because   it   pleaseth   thee. 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  201 


Our  hearts  at  any  time  will  tell 
If  thou  or  I  be  sick  or  well." 

Keats  loved  these  poems  for  their  womanly, 
as  well  as  their  poetic,  qualities.  Where  else 
can  we  look  in  all  literature  for  such  an  apothe- 
osis of  love  between  woman  and  woman — love 
on  earth  even  as  it  is  in  heaven?  She  was  a 
true  lover  indeed.  Was  there  e\'er  one  quite 
like  her?     One  of  these  poems  is  addressed  : 

To  my  excellent  Liicasia  on  onr  friendship : 

"  I  did  not  live  until  this  time 
Crowned   my   felicity, 
When  I  could  say  without  a  crime, 
I  am  not  thine,   but  thee." 

We  find  a  poem  addressed  to  Mr.  Henry 
I. awes,*  which  carries  us  back  into  the  circle 
of  Milton's  friends  once  more. 

*  "  Henry  Lawes,  who  composed  the  musick  for  Comus 
and  performed  the  combined  characters  of  tlie  Spirit  and  tlic 
sliepherd  Thyrsis  in  this  drama,  was  the  son  of  Thomas 
Lawes,  a  vicar-choral  of  Salisbury  Cathedral."  .  .  .  He 
appears  to  have  been  well  acquainted  with  liie  best  poets 
and  the  most  respectable  and  popular  of  the  nobility  of  his 
times.  .     .     Lawes  is  said  to  be  the  first  who  introduced 

the    Italian    style   of    music    into   England.  .      .      lie   ilied 


202  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


To  him  she  writes : 

"  Beauty  is  but  composure,  and   we  find 
Content  is  but  the  concord  of  the  mind. 

So  poets  on  the  lower  world  look  down, 

But  Lawes  on   them  ;   his  height  is  all  his  own  ; 

in  1662,  and  was  buried  in  Westminster  Abbey.  Of  all  the 
testimonies  paid  to  his  merit  by  his  contemporaries,  Milton's 
commendation,  in  the  thirteenth  sonnet  and  in  some  of  the 
speeches  in  "Conius,"  must  be  esteemed  the  most  honorable. 

Sonnet  XIII. 
To  Mr.   II.   Lawes,   on  tin-  piihlishiug  his  Airs. 
Harry,  whose  tuneful  and  well-measured  song 

First  taught  our  English  music  how  to  span 

Words  with  just  note  and  accent,  not  to  scan 
With  Midas  ears,  committing  short  and  long. 
Thy  worth  and  skill  exempts  thee  from  the  throng. 

With  praise  enough  for  envy  to  look  wan  ; 

To  after  age  thou  shall  be  writ  the  man, 
That  with  smooth  air  couldst  humor  best  our  tongue. 
Thou  honor'st  verse,  and   verse  must  lend  her  wing 

To  honor  thee,   the  priest   of  Phoebus'  quire. 

That  tun"st  their  happiest  lines  in  hymn  or  story; 

Dante  shall  give  Fame  leave  to  set  thee  higher 
Than  his  Casella.  whom  he  woo'd  to  sing. 

Met  in  the   milder  shades  of  Purgatory. 

"The  songs  of  Lawes,  to  a  very  great  number,  are  to  be 
found  in  the  collections  entitled  'Select  Musical  Ayres  and 
Dialogues,'  folio  1652;  'Ayres  and  Dialogues.'  1653;  and 
•The  Treasury  of  Music,'  i66g.  .  .  .  Among  them  are 
most  of  the  songs  of  Waller  set  by  Lawes." 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray 


20} 


For,  like   Divinity   itself,  his  lyre 

Rewards  the  wit  it  did  at  first  inspire, 

And   thus  by  double  right  poets  allow 

His  and  their  laurel  should  adorn  his  brow." 


Her  wit   is  cliarminL^!     Sec  tlie  fojlowin*^ : 

"Hoist  up  the  sail,  cry'd   they  who  understand 
No  word   that  carries  kindness  for  the  LAND; 
Such  sons  of  clamour,  that   I   wonder  not 
They  love  the    sea,   wiioni  sure  some  stoini   bej^ot." 


204  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


Of  pleasure  she  writes: 

"  We  covet  pleasure  easily, 

But  it  not  so   possess  ; 
For  many  things  must  make  it  be, 

But  one  may  make  it  less  ; 
Nay,  were  our   state   as  we   could    choose   it, 
'Twould  be  consumed  by  fear  to  lose  it." 

And  again  of  death  : 

"  If  I  be  sure  my  soul  is  safe, 

And  that  my  actions  will   provide 
My  tomb  a  nobler  epitaph. 

Than  that  I   only  live  and  dy'd, 

"  So  that  in   various  accidents 

I  conscience  may,  and  honor  keep  ; 
I  with  that  ease  and  innocence 
Shall  die   as   infants   go  to  sleep." 

We  find  ourselves  let  loose  in  a  flower-bed  ; 
how  can  we  stop  gathering  the  beautiful  things! 
Keats  is  half  at  fault  for  this,  for  he  led  us 
hither.  But  the  old  book  must  be  resolutely- 
closed  with  a  commendation  to  those  who  love 
true  simple  poetry  to  get  the  volume  of  "  The 
Matchless  Orinda  "  and  read  her  verses  ! 

As  I  turn  to  review  the  books  once  more,  I 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  205 


seem    to    see    one     kindly    face — large,    full    of 
humor,  full  of  human  sympathies,  which  makes 
me  forget  the   shelves  and   consider  "  first  edi- 
tions ■'    as    childishness.     The    face    belongs  to 
Thackeray,  and    I    can    recall    his    goodness  to 
one;  who,  although  married  already,  was  hardly 
more  than  "  a   slip  of   a  girl,"  and  very  much 
afraid   of   him.     Afraid,   let   me   say,   rather   of 
the  idea  of  him,  the  great  author  and  famous 
lecturer,  who    was    making    his    crowded    audi- 
ences laugh   or  cry    at   his  simple  word   every 
evening;  the  great  man  of  the  moment  whom 
everybody  was   "  running  after,"  yet  of  whom 
they   said   that    he    liked    his    friends   so   much 
better  than  all  their  noise  about  himself  that  he 
was  always  trying  to  escape  from  it,  and  here 
he  was!    coming  to  see — whom?      Well,  it  ap- 
pears  it   did   not   so  much    matter,  for  he  was 
bent  on  kindnesses,  and  he  took  it  all  in  at  a 
glance,  and  sat  down   b\-  the  window  and   drew 
me  to  him  and  told  me  about  his  "little  girls" 
at   home.      How    he    walked   down    the    wrong 
side   of   Piccadilly   one    da\-,    and    so    lost    what 
money    he    had     out     of     his    pockt't — money 
which    belonged    properly   to    these    same  dear 


2o6  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


o-irls  of  his  ;  therefore  it  came  about  that 
he  made  up  his  mind,  though  it  was  hard 
enough,  to  come  away  from  them  and  get 
something  to  take  back  to  them  in  place  of 
what  he  had  lost,  and  how  they  were  the  dear- 
est girls  in  the  world,  and  when  I  came  to 
England  I  should  find  them  more  like  two  old 
friends,  and  should  have  somebody,  I  am  sure 
he  thought,  "  to  play  with,"  though  under  the 
circumstances  he  could  not  use  just  those 
words  ! 

And  then,  soon  after,  he  went  away,  leaving 
a  irreat  trail  of  sunshine  and  kindness  behind 
him,  which  has  never  faded. 

The  next  time  I  saw  him  among  the  books, 
was  with  a  company  of  gentlemen  who  had 
been  asked  to  meet  him.  I  remember  he  was 
told  that  Rufus  Choate  was  one  of  the  invited 
guests,  but  he  had  not  yet  made  his  appear- 
ance. A  note  from  Mr.  Choate  came  in  after 
the  little  group  was  assembled,  and  it  was  a 
p-reat  amusement  to  them  all,  the  effort  to 
decipher  the  almost  undecipherable  handwrit- 
ino-.  The  gist  of  the  matter  was  at  length 
reached— he  could  not  come.     And  Thackeray, 


i 


^ 


Thackeray  when  about  Thirty  Years  Old. 


V 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray 


209 


who  had    never   heard — but   onl\'  heard  of — his 
eloquence,  was  greath'  disappointed. 


V^^-^^^^^-^  "^^^'^ 


The    joy    of    hearing    tlie    immortal    lectures 
then   began  I      1  low  "  everybody  "  went  I      1  low 
14 


2IO  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


the  matter  and  the  manner  were  upon  every 
tongue  !  There  are  two  drawings  on  the  shelf 
of  him  made  by  a  young  artist  of  the  time, 
caricatures  which,  in  spite  of  their  absurdity, 
recall  his  delightful  manner  and  looks  as  he 
stood  before  his  audiences,  to  the  life.  I  re- 
member one  other  interview  with  Thackeray 
during  his  visit  to  America,  in  New  York 
(and  it  is  a  digression  to  speak  of  it  here,  to 
be  forgiven,  I  trust).  He  w^as  coming  down 
a  long  flight  of  steps  into  the  street  after  one 
of  the  lectures.  We  were  in  front,  and  we 
were  with  Washington  Irving  (ah,  what  a 
joy  that  w^as,  and  what  a  gladness  still  to 
recall  him !)  Thackeray  startled  the  little 
group  by  overtaking  us  and  striking  Irving 
briskly  on  the  shoulder  (they  were  evidently 
much  at  home  together) ;  then  turning  to  us, 
"  And  here's  the  very  little  woman  I  was  telling 
you  of  to-day!"  at  which  sally,  since  he  evi- 
dently had  not  been  telling  anything  very  seri- 
ous, we  all  laughed,  and  then  he  began  to  relate 
the  experiences  of  the  evening.  It  was  only  a 
touch,  a  glance,  a  nothing,  as  one  may  say,  but 
that  warmth  and  sunlight  of  his  nature  always 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray 


21  1 


seemed    to    waken    a    new  flower   of   existence 
into  being  where  it  shone  even  for  an  instant. 


Tell  Tale    - 

A  Caricature   by   Cruikshank 

Here  arc  tlie  first  editions  of  some  of  his 
books:  "Thr  Ivose  and  the  King,"  "  l^r.  Hiiih 
and    His    ^^)un<>•    Friends,"  "  Rebecca  and    Ko 


212  A  Shelf  of  Old  Books 


wena,"  and  a  review  of  Cruikshank's  work 
made  into  a  pretty  little  volume  with  original 
illustrations ;  but  how  we  almost  forget  to 
speak  of  them  when  we  are  thinking  of  the 
dear  writer  himself."  I  sometimes  wonder  if 
the  "  Unwritten  Memoirs  "  will  not  some  day 
recall  one  of  the  Punch  dinners  in  Onslow 
Square,  when  I  was  allowed  to  sit  up-stairs 
"with  the  ladies,"  his  own  "dear  girls"  (I  do 

*  Thackeray's  charm  was  never  more  delightfully  exercised 
than  in  this  paper  upon  Cruikshank.  He  says  in  it,  "  He  is 
the  friend  of  the  young  especially.  Have  we  not  all  read 
the  story-boojis  that  his  wonderful  pencil  has  illustrated  ?  Did 
we  not  forego  tarts,  in  order  to  buy  his  '  IJreaking-Up'  or  his 
'Fashionable  Monstrosities"  of  the  year  eighteen  hundred  and 
something?  .  .  .  But  though  in  our  eyes  Mr.  Cruikshank 
reached  his  apogee  some  eighteen  years  since,  it  must  not  be 
imagined  that  such  was  really  the  case.  Eighteen  sets  of 
children  have  since  then  learned  to  love  and  admire  him, 
and  may  many  more  of  their  successors  be  brought  up  in  the 
same  delightful  faith.  .  .  .  The  reader  will  examine  the 
work  called  '  My  Sketch-Book '  with  not  a  little  amusement, 
and  may  gather  from  it,  as  we  fancy,  a  good  deal  of  informa- 
tion regarding  the  character  of  the  individual  man,  George 
Cruikshank.  .  .  .  Our  artist  loves  to  joke  at  a  soldier. 
Tall  life-guardsmen  and  fierce  grenadiers  figure  in 
many  of  his  designs,  and  almost  always  in  a  ridiculous 
way." 


From  Milton  to  Thackeray  213 


not  recall  any  strangers),  and  how  some  of  the 
good  things  were  brought  to  us  for  dinner  on 
a  small  table  in  the  hall  if  I  remember  well, 
where  Thackeray  came  now  and  then  in  the 
course  of  the  evening  to  have  a  little  jollity 
and  see  that  the  ball  was  rolling  merrily  up- 
stairs as  well  as  down.  The  good  things 
which  came  with  him  were  so  much  better 
than  any  of  tlie  good  things  which  were 
brought  for  dinner,  that  I  forget  everything, 
what  was  said  or  what  was  done  or  what 
we  ate,  save  that  kind,  loving,  beneficent 
presence  which  will  always  remain  in  our 
hearts  when  the  things  of  this  world  have 
passed  awa)'. 

It  need  not  be  told  here  that  Thackeray  loved 
the  Lrreat  world  and  the  stramje,  noble,  and 
even  ignoble  creatures  it  contains;  he  loved 
delightful  women  alwa\"s,  and  *'  liked  to  see 
them  straight  "  as  he  says  somcw  here  ;  antl 
would  have  said  to  his  favorites,  as  Dr.  John- 
son said  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  "  Be  brisk,  and  be 
splendid,  and  be  publick  ;  "  but  he  lovetl  above 
all  his  fireside-corner  and  his  "little  girls"  and 
the    friends  the)'  drew  about    them.      Not    the 


II 


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From  Milton  to  Thnckerny  215 


least  characteristic  incident  of  his  life  is  his 
flight  home  from  America,  leaving  his  engage- 
ments to  lecture  and  everything  else  to  take 
care  of  themselves,  because  he  saw  Christmas 
approaching  and  stockings  which  might  be 
otherwise  unfilled.  He  bravely  said  he  was 
homesick;  and  with  no  excuse  to  any  one,  he 
stepped  on  board  a  Boston  steamer,  and  van- 
ished thus  from  the  centre  of  his   admirers. 


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